Agenda item

To consider the outcome of the HMIP Thematic Inspection into “The experiences of black and mixed heritage boys in the youth justice system” April – June 2021.

Jackie Difolco, Assistant Director: Early Help, Prevention and SEND, reported on the outcome of the HMIP Thematic Inspection of “The experiences of black and mixed heritage boys in the youth justice system”.  Haringey was one of nine local authorities inspected at and one of three youth justice services in London. 

The report highlighted key factors young people experienced, including:

·         Multiple adverse childhood experiences;

·         High levels of need, such as special educational needs (SEN) and mental health difficulties;

·         High rates of school exclusion, poor attainment and evidence of SEN not being fully addressed;

·         Almost a third had been victims of child criminal exploitation; 

·         Experience of racial discrimination;

·         A third of the boys had been subject to Child in Need or Child Protection plans;

·         In over a quarter of cases, young people had a disability; and

·         Lived in areas of economic deprivation.

There were 18 recommendations, including four that were specifically for local authorities.  There was positive feedback on the findings within Haringey’s Youth Justice Service.  This included:

·         Implementation of  cultural change;

·         Focussed on and utilising a “child first” approach;

·         Evidence of robust work to address disproportionality;

·         Embedded specific interventions to improve the experience and outcomes for the black and mixed heritage boys; and

·         High levels of motivation and confidence amongst staff.

Haringey had also been identified as an example of good practice in a case study that was reflected within the thematic inspection report. Haringey Youth Justice was also featured within a national Effective Practice Guide published by the Youth Justice Board.

There were four areas that were flagged up as requiring improvement though and work was taking place to address these.  An in-depth partnership plan had been developed and examples of actions and work completed to date included:

·         Partners using their own data to help inform work and better understand how individual improvements could be made to address disproportionality;

·         A new quality assurance tool had been developed which included a focus on how ethnicity and diversity was considered and informed planning and interventions;

·         A “temperature check” had been conducted with staff to explore how they were engaging with fathers to support improving outcomes;

·         Where young people had been stopped and searched by the Police, this was now recorded as a “significant life event” to ensure that young people were able to talk about their experience, the impact it had on them and used to inform planning and interventions; and

·         Commitment to ensure that more mental health, speech and language support was provided.

The Panel commended the service for the good work that had been highlighted in the report.  Members commented that youth justice plans were not always shared with parents.  Stop and Search had also been a big issue in the past but the situation may have deteriorated so needed to be addressed.  It was also felt important that data was not only kept but also acted upon. The importance of diversionary projects was also highlighted. 

Ms Difolco reported that plans were routinely shared with parents in Haringey.  There were a number of strands of work aimed at addressing stop and search through the Youth Justice Service.  These included young people being used to train Police officers. The service was also looking at how data is used to inform strategic planning.  In respect of diversionary projects, these were not restricted to just those already within the criminal youth justice system but were being extended to those young people who had received with out-of-court disposals and a sanction and to siblings of young people known to the Youth Justice Service.

Ms Hendricks reported that work was being undertaken with the Police regarding the Stop and Search and this involved looking at it from a safeguarding perspective.   The service wished to use data to influence change within the system.  It was agreed that she would report back in due course when the work had been further developed.

In respect of the collection of ethnic monitoring data, Ms Difolco reported that this was collected and was based on the common ethnicity categories and how young people identified their ethnicity.   It was therefore possible to break data down into different demographics.  In answer to a question, she stated that the Youth Justice Service’s workforce was representative of the young people that it supported as were the decision making panels that considered individual cases.  The issue of whether the workforce of the partnership as a whole was representative was something that was not known but could be explored. Over half of the young people that came into contact with the service were young black men and a smaller proportion were mixed race.  Inspectors had highlighted the bespoke interventions in Haringey that were targeted at young black men as positive

The Panel requested that a report be made to the Panel in due course regarding the outcome of the safeguarding work that was being undertaken by the C&YP Service and the Police on Stop and Search.  In addition, they requested further information regarding the interventions undertaken by the Youth Offending Service with young people and their effectiveness. This would be incorporated into the Youth Justice Annual Plan for 2022-2023 which reports on the progress of interventions.

AGREED:

1.    That a report be made to the Panel in due course regarding the outcome of the safeguarding work that was being undertaken by the C&YP Service and the Police on Stop and Search.

2.    That the Youth Justice Annual Plan for 2022-2023, which reports on interventions with young people and effectiveness, be shared with the Panel when available.