'Swamping' fear over YJB change
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
The former chair of the Youth Justice Board (YJB) has raised concerns after figures revealed changes made to a new system for dealing with young offenders would result in more receiving intensive intervention.
Figures released in the House of Lords show that revisions to the banding system used for the Scaled Approach will mean double the number of young people being dealt with "intensively". In the original proposal, 63 per cent of children would receive low-level intervention, 33 per cent medium, and four per cent high.
This changes to 21 percent standard, 69 per cent enhanced and 10 per cent intensive in the latest version.
Rod Morgan warned the changes could mean "that high-risk cases will not get the attention they need because the system will be swamped with relatively low-risk cases".
