Youth courts were introduced because we believed that doing so was right as part of the process of dealing with the problem of persistent offenders, particularly 16 and 17-year-old offenders.When I have visited projects related to the youth courts and discussed issues with people who work in them, I have been told that, far from being in direct contradiction to children's hearings, the youth court model has effectively incorporated some of the best qualities of children's hearings in getting...