Reduced re-offending by young people
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Young people who commit offences should be held to account, but they also need the right support and interventions to address their offending behaviour and turn their lives around.
Getting youth offenders back on track
New Zealand is developing a Youth Crime Action Plan, led by the Ministry of Justice. Child, Youth and Family is a core partner in the development of the Plan. We anticipate that the improvements envisaged will make a significant contribution to reducing youth reoffending.
Fresh Start
Since 2010, the Fresh Start reforms have given us a wider range of options for holding young offenders to account and for managing the risk to their communities.
Through the reforms, we support a range of community-based programmes. In 2011/2012, the numbers of young offenders diverted towards more positive activities through Fresh Start programmes included:
- 461 in community youth development programmes for low-level offenders designed to develop positive social attitudes, values, and behaviours (up from 331 in 2010/2011)
- 698 in mentoring programmes providing individualised and intensive support and guidance to young offenders (up from 471 in 2010/2011)
- 524 in parenting education programmes to develop parenting skills (up from 374 in 2010/2011)
- 660 in community day programmes and 55 in residential programmes for young offenders who need help with alcohol or drug addictions
- 172 on supported bail involving intensive community-based support and services to reduce the likelihood of offending on bail and the risk of a subsequent remand to a Youth Justice residence.
Military-style Activity Camps
The Military-style Activity Camp (MAC) programme currently targets the most serious youth recidivist offenders, when other options have been exhausted. This programme is delivered in partnership with the New Zealand Defence Force and community social service providers.
The MAC programme involves two phases:
- a residential-based phase, which includes a wilderness camp and interventions to address the young person’s individual needs
- a community-based phase, which involves ongoing support for the young person and their family.
This year, 32 young people successfully completed a MAC programme as part of a Supervision with Residence Order. The next MAC programmes are scheduled for July and October 2012.
MAC programmes specifically address the underlying causes of offending behaviour, including alcohol and drug treatment as well as parenting and education courses.
Doing our best for young offenders
Youth Justice Family Group Conferences
A Youth Justice Family Group Conference is a meeting between a young offender, their family, victims and other stakeholders such as the Police, a social worker or a youth advocate, to discuss how to address the young person’s offending.
This year, 7,069 Youth Justice Family Group Conferences were held, almost 98 per cent within the statutory timeframes. Youth Justice Family Group Conference plans were prepared for 3,955 children and young people, and 90 per cent of them met the objectives of their plans[1]
This process allows us to intervene early before offending escalates. Most young people do not come back to the attention of Child, Youth and Family for offending within the year following their Family Group Conference. Due to the success of the Family Group Conference system in New Zealand, many other countries have adopted a similar process.
When a young person has committed an offence of sufficient concern, we receive a referral from the New Zealand Police, or a direction from the Youth Court to convene a Family Group Conference.
Youth Justice residential facilities
We have four Youth Justice residences, housing a maximum of 146 young people at any one time.
In 2011/2012, we introduced a number of initiatives in our youth justice residences with the aim of supporting young people by encouraging teamwork and fair play. The Kids Voices video conferences was an initiative that gave young people the opportunity to talk to important people in New Zealand about their concerns, including the Children's Commissioner and the Principal Youth Court Judge. These forums were designed to encourage young people to have a say in matters that affect their care in residences.
Our youth justice facilities have programmes aimed at helping serious young offenders turn their lives around.
Social Services Select Committee inquiry into child offenders
This year, we have provided advice and support to the Social Services Select Committee inquiry into the identification, rehabilitation, and care and protection of child offenders. The Committee’s report was tabled in the House on 20 June 2012.
Themes from the report’s 31 recommendations included:
- improvements in the effectiveness of how we work with child offenders
- clarity of where accountability for child offenders lies among government agencies
- broadening the powers of the Family Court in relation to child offenders.
We will table the Government’s response in the House on 12 September 2012.
[1] A Youth Justice Family Group Conference does not necessarily result in a Family Group Conference plan being agreed on.
The future
Our work to deliver against this outcome in 2011/2012 has positioned us well to contribute to the cross-sector response to achieve Better Public Services Result 7: Reduce the rates of total crime, violent crime and youth crime and Better Public Services Result 8: Reduce reoffending.
2011–2014 Statement of Intent Performance Indicators
Reduced reoffending by young people[2]
|
MEASURE[3] |
RESULT |
TREND/COMMENT |
|
Intermediate Outcome – Fewer young people are at risk of re-entering the justice system | ||
|
Percentage of young offenders who reoffend within one year of a previous offence |
37.2%[4] (No trend available) |
New measure for 2011/2012. Intent: Decreasing. There were 2,098 young offenders in 2011/2012 and of these, 780 reoffended within one year of a previous offence. |
|
Percentage of young offenders whose reoffending within one year has reduced in severity |
19.6% (No trend available) |
New measure for 2011/2012. Intent: Increasing. Of the 780 young offenders who had reoffended within one year:
A new seriousness scale for the justice sector will be introduced in 2012/2013. |
|
MEASURE |
RESULT |
TREND/COMMENT |
|
Intermediate Outcome – More young offenders are in education, training or employment | ||
|
Percentage of young offenders who are in education, training, or employment following our intervention |
52.3% (No trend available) |
New measure for 2011/2012. Intent: Increasing. Of the 1,955 clients who completed a youth justice intervention, 1,023 were in education, training or employment. |
[2] ‘Reoffending’ means the young person was referred back to Child, Youth and Family for reoffending (the Police may deal directly with low-level offending and not refer to Child, Youth and Family).
[3] These measures were implemented with the introduction of Fresh Start in October 2010.
[4] In the United Kingdom, in 2011, 56 per cent of young offenders who received a Court sentence offended within one year.
Erratum
The Ministry of Social Development has identified data errors in Child, Youth and Family’s official data that require correcting in the Annual Report. Whilst the errors are not material, the Ministry considers it prudent to release corrected versions of the relevant sections and these are set out below.
Doing our best for young offenders
Youth Justice Family Group Conferences
This year, 7,284 Youth Justice Family Group Conferences were held, almost 98.2 per cent within the statutory timeframes. Youth Justice Family Group Conference plans were prepared for 4,433 children and young people, and 91 per cent of them met the objectives of their plans[1].
[1] A Youth Justice Family Group Conference does not necessarily result in a Family Group Conference plan being agreed on.
