To review the draft Youth Justice Plan 2018/19 at appendix a, and agree for the plan to be considered by full council.

The Youth Justice Plan forms part of the council’s budget and policy framework and is reserved to full council to approve.

The cabinet member children and families introduced the item, supported by the head of service, West Mercia Youth Justice Service. It was highlighted that:

·         it was a requirement of national government to produce an annual Youth Justice Plan, the plan covered the whole of the West Mercia area but included  specific data on Herefordshire;

·         the report had been considered by the children and young people’s scrutiny committee and subject to the decision of cabinet would progress to full council for final approval in October 2018;

·         there had been a decrease in the number of first time entrants and while the actual number of young people offending was very small it was still important to reduce this figure;

·         the use of custodial sentences was reducing;

·         the data showed that there was a higher level of reoffending in Herefordshire than in West Mercia as a whole but that those young people who did reoffend did so with less frequency;

·         the service had been subject to a pilot join inspection at the end of 2017/18, no inspection report was published as the main purpose of the pilot was to test the new inspection methodology and framework but commentary on the inspection findings was included in the plan;

·         the service was judged as requiring improvement overall but was rated as good in seven of the 12 inspection standards, an improvement plan had been agreed to address the findings of the inspection and the actions included in the delivery plan on pages 15 to 17 of the Youth Justice Plan.

In discussion of the item it was noted:

·         that appropriate staff training was required and this was planned as part of the delivery plan;

·         that through care for young people receiving custodial sentences was generally good although there were sometimes issues with accommodation;

·         the clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) were a statutory consultee on the plan as they contributed to the funding of the youth justice service.

The chair of the children and young people’s scrutiny committee gave feedback from the committee’s consideration of the draft report. She explained that the committee had questions about figures in the report which were not able to be answered on the day as representatives of partner agencies were not present. They would be invited to attend when the 2019/20 plan was scrutinised. The committee welcomed the progress that had been made in reducing first time entrants and supported the increase in the use of informal responses but expressed concern about the level of reoffending. It was noted that the committee had struggled to understand what the plan did, what it achieved and who it was aimed at. It was noted that the presentation of figures in a high level plan when actual numbers were very small was difficult.

Group leaders were invited to give the views of their group. The concerns regarding reoffending were generally shared and it was noted that as the plan was a service plan it was not a particularly engaging document.

It was agreed that:

a)    the Youth Justice Plan 2018/19 (appendix a) be recommended for approval by full Council.