Abstract
New Chair of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales ‘in Favour of a Review of the Age of Criminal Responsibility’
The Conservative / Liberal Democrat Coalition government has consistently refused to consider any increase in the age of criminal responsibility, currently set at 10 years in accord with the Children and Young Persons Act 1963. In December 2012, for instance, responding to a call by more than 50 experts to review the age at which children can be considered criminally liable, Jeremy Wright, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State with responsibility for youth justice, confirmed the government’s opinion that such a review was unnecessary since ‘children do know the difference between right and wrong at age 10’. In the same month, Damian Green, Minister with responsibility for policing and criminal justice, similarly rejected suggestions that the age of criminal responsibility should be raised to at least 12 years to comply with the recommendation of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. In answer to a Parliamentary question on the issue, he maintained that it was: … entirely appropriate to hold children aged 10 and over to account for their actions, and to allow the criminal courts to decide on an effective punishment when an offence has been committed. It is important to communities, and particularly important to victims, to know that young people who offend will be dealt with appropriately.
More recently, in January 2013, Lord McNally, then Justice Minister in the House of Lords, conceded that many European jurisdictions have a higher age of criminal responsibility than those in the UK, but argued that it was misleading to make such comparisons since: … youth justice systems and supporting social systems vary greatly across Europe. It is for individual countries to make a decision based on their own circumstances and procedures. We believe that the age of criminal responsibility in England and Wales accurately reflects what is required by our justice system.
In the interim period, Lord McNally has been appointed chair of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, a position that he took up in March 2014. In an interview with Children and Young People Now magazine, published the following month, he indicated that he personally favoured a review of the age of criminal responsibility, pointing out that the recent trajectory of youth justice policy had been to divert children, and younger children in particular, away from the youth justice system. For instance, whereas in 2004/5, children aged between 10 to 13 years accounted for 17.4 per cent of those receiving a substantive youth justice disposal, the equivalent figure in 2012/13 was 10.2 per cent. Similarly, while in the former year 12.6 per cent of those receiving a custodial sentence were below the age of 15 years, by the latter year, that figure had fallen to 7.9 per cent.
While Lord McNally’s comments are clearly in tension with the government’s stated position, it might be noted that he is a Liberal Democrat peer and that his party’s policy, agreed at their Spring Conference in 2011, is to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14 years.
Jeremy Wright’s comments appear in Letter to the National Association for Youth Justice, 14 December 2012. Damian Green’s answer appears at Hansard, House of Commons, 18 December 2012, column 686. Lord McNally’s comments as Justice Minister appear at Hansard, House of Lords, 15 January 2013, column WA122. The figures for age related breakdown of the youth justice and custodial populations are derived from Youth Justice Annual Statistics 2004/5 and Youth Justice Statistics 2012/13, supplementary tables. Lord McNally’s interview as Chair of the Youth Justice Board appears in Children and Young People Now, 17 April 2014, available at: http://www.cypnow.co.uk/cyp/news/1143569/yjb-chair-lord-mcnally-backs-age-criminality-review?utm_content=&utm_campaign=170414_YouthJustice_MAN_BULL_PROMO&utm_source=Children%20%26%20Young%20People%20Now&utm_medium=adestra_email&utm_term=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cypnow.co.uk%2Fcyp%2Fnews%2F1143569%2Fyjb-chair-lord-mcnally-backs-age-criminality-review
Youth Justice Board for England and Wales’ Research Budget Falls to Zero in 2012/2013
On 31 March 2014, in answer to a Parliamentary question, Jeremy Wright, Under-Secretary of State with responsibility for youth justice, indicated that the Youth Justice Board’s expenditure on research has fallen considerably in recent years, from £666,000 in 2009/10 to zero in 2012/13. As shown in Table 1, the research budget has also fallen as a proportion of the Board’s total expenditure.
Youth Justice Board expenditure on research: 2009/10 to 2012/13.
The minister explained that no research was undertaken during 2012/13 to allow ‘the completion and publication of ongoing research projects’. Projections for the research budget for 2013/14 are not currently available but are scheduled for publication in July 2014.
The Minister’s answer is given at Hansard, House of Commons 31 March 2014, column 457W.
The Number of Children Admitted to ‘Youth Correctional Services’ in Canada Declines by Seven Per Cent in a Year
Figures given in a report published by Juristat show there was fall in 2011/12 of seven per cent over the previous year, in the number of children below the age of 18 years who commenced a programme of supervision in the community or a correctional institution. All but two of the nine Canadian jurisdictions submitting data recorded a decline. The increase in Prince Edward Island was just one per cent, while Manitoba reported a 12 per cent rise. Yukon experienced the biggest reduction of 42 per cent. Nationally, fewer than half – 42 per cent – of all admissions were to custodial institutions. The large majority of custodial episodes were instances of pre-trial detention which accounted for more than four fifths of the total. Of the 14,252 children admitted to custody, just 1111 – or 7.8 per cent – entered secure custodial provision.
As might be anticipated, boys outnumbered girls by more than three to one. The profile of the youth justice population is one that increases progressively with age, as shown in Table 2, reflecting the fact that the peak age of offending in Canada is 18 years. Less than one per cent of admissions related to children aged 12 years; by contrast, 17 year-olds accounted for almost one in three of the total. Declines in admission were recorded for all ages during 2011/12 with the most significant decreases occurring for 13 year-olds and 15 year-olds (16 and 15 per cent respectively).
Admissions to youth correctional services 2010/11.
Aboriginal children continue to be overrepresented in the youth justice system. While such children make up seven per cent of the general population, in 2011/12 they constituted 39 per cent of admissions to correctional services. As indicated in Table 3, the overrepresentation was more pronounced for Aboriginal girls and among children admitted to secure custodial provision.
Admissions to selected correctional services by Aboriginal status and gender.
Admissions to Youth Correctional Services in Canada, 2011/2012, by Samuel Perreault, is published by Jurisdat and is available at: www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/85-002-x/2014001/article/11917-eng.htm
Reductions in Delays in the US Juvenile Justice System may be Linked to Declining Workloads
A report published in February 2014 notes that, unlike adults, juveniles do not enjoy a constitutional right to a speedy trial. A number of standards for maximum processing timescales have been published but they vary widely and are rarely compulsory in any event. For instance, while the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges/ Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Guidelines propose a maximum of 25 days from referral to disposition for children who are in detention – and 40 days for those in the community – standards produced by the National District Attorneys Association suggest equivalent maxima of 60 and 90 days respectively. Moreover, it is clear from the research that many jurisdictions continue to exceed the latter, more tolerant, standards in a considerable number of cases.
The latest available data, for 2004, indicate that the median number of days from referral to disposition for all juvenile delinquency was 44. However, in 29 per cent of cases, the delay exceeded 90 days. These figures nonetheless represent a considerable improvement over the previous decade: in 1995, the median delay to disposition was 49 days and in 32 per cent of cases it was over 90 days.
The author of the report notes that part of the explanation for the improvement is that, in the interim period, there was a considerable reduction in the number of cases processed, from 600,415 in the former year to 552,600 in the latter, a fall of almost eight per cent. In this context, it might be speculated that higher workloads contribute to delay. This possibility is given greater credence since the number of days from referral to disposition is also related to the size of geographical area. As indicated in Table 4, in 2004, larger counties were associated with lengthier delays.
Delays from referral to disposition by size of county - 2004.
However, workload alone does not fully account for the variation. Between 1995 and 2005, for instance, the number of cases processed in small counties rose, contrary to the national trend, by 11 per cent, but delays remained relatively stable. In large counties, caseloads decreased by five per cent over the same period and median processing times fell by 12 per cent. However the reduction was no greater even in those large counties that experienced declining caseloads of more than 50 per cent.
While it would thus appear that throughput is one factor impacting on delay, there are other influences. The report notes, for instance, that areas with above average levels of child detention also tend to display longer times from referral to disposition. Moreover, findings from three case studies in areas that had effectively addressed delay indicate that a commitment to case management within the court – with the specific intent of reducing the time from referral to disposition – can mitigate the impact of workload and the nature of cases going through the system.
Delays in Youth Justice, by Phil Bulman, is published by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and is available at: www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/237149.pdf
Juvenile Arrests in 2011 in the United States 11 Per Cent Lower than in Previous Year
During 2011, there were an estimated 1,470,000 juvenile arrests in the United States, representing an 11 per cent reduction over the previous year. The trend of declining arrests has been consistent over the longer term. Moreover, it would appear to have accelerated in the more recent period: the number of arrests in 2011 was 31 per cent lower than in 2002, but 29 per cent below the equivalent figure for 2007.
The reduction in juvenile arrests has been experienced across all offence types and, in this regard, differs significantly from the pattern for adults. For instance, between 2002 and 2011, adult arrests for murder, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault (the four offences that constitute the violent crime index) fell by 12 per cent but the equivalent fall for juveniles was 27 per cent, the lowest level of arrests for 32 years. Over the same period, while adult arrests for property crimes rose by 15 per cent, juvenile arrests for such offences declined by 30 per cent.
One result of arrest trends over the longer-term has been to narrow the gap between girls and boys. Between 1980 and 1994, the male juvenile arrest rate per 100,000 in the general population rose by 60 per cent for violent offences, while that for girls more than doubled. More recently, the decline for boys has also been sharper. Consequently, whereas during the 1980s the arrest rate for boys was eight times that for girls, in 2011, it was just four times greater. A similar closer alignment has occurred in relation to property offences, but in this case it is explained by the fact that the reduction in the rate of offending for boys commenced about ten years earlier – from the late 1980s onwards – than that for girls.
Juvenile Arrests 2011, by Charles Puzzanchera, is published by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and is available at: www.ojjdp.gov/pubs/244476.pdf
Silk Commission on ‘Legislative Powers to Strengthen Wales’, Recommends the Devolution of Youth Justice
England and Wales is a single jurisdiction for criminal justice purposes, including the legislative and administrative framework for the delivery of youth justice. However, under the Government of Wales Act 2006, the Welsh National Assembly has devolved responsibility for 20 areas where the UK Parliament has conferred legislative powers. These include education and training, health and local government. This complicates the interface between devolved and non-devolved functions in relation to youth justice since many of the factors relating to youth crime are the responsibility of the Welsh Assembly. Local authorities are moreover required under the Children Act 1989 to reduce the need for criminal proceedings against children in their area, and social services, health and education are each required, under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, to contribute staffing and resources to youth offending teams.
The All Wales Youth Offending Strategy, published in 2004, has also established a number of principles for youth justice in Wales that diverge in some respects from the approach that has tended to prevail in England. For instance, the document requires that ‘young people should be treated as children first and offenders second’, with a focus on promoting the child’s welfare as a primary concern. In addition, the extension of ‘universal entitlements’ to all children, including those within the justice system, forms a major part of the Welsh strategy and has no equivalent in England. Finally, many children from Wales who are remanded or sentenced to custody are ‘exported’ to custodial institutions in England and concern has been expressed as to the extent that such placements are able to meet their cultural and resettlement needs.
In 2011, following the result of a referendum that favoured the Welsh National Assembly being given primary legislative powers, the UK Government established the Silk Commission with a remit to: … review the powers of the National Assembly for Wales in the light of experience and to recommend modifications to the present constitutional arrangements that would enable the United Kingdom Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales to better serve the people of Wales.
The arrangements reviewed include those for the delivery of criminal justice. The Commission’s review was published in March 2014.
In relation to youth justice, the report confirms the tensions in the existing arrangements whereby the bulk of children’s services are devolved but the administration of criminal justice for those below the age of 18 years is not. The Commission concludes that: … administrative responsibility for the treatment and rehabilitation of youth offenders should be devolved, particularly bearing in mind the close links that exist with services provided by local authorities.
It is acknowledged that some Welsh children will continue to be imprisoned outside of Wales and that cross-border placement arrangements will need to be established and that this may entail a system of charging.
The review also recommends that policing, with the exception of the responsibilities of the National Crime Agency which deals with serious and organized crime, should be devolved. At the current time, it is proposed that there should not be a wholesale devolution of the remaining elements of the justice system. However the Commission considers that there should be ‘an implementation review’ for devolving probation and prisons once the devolution of policing has been achieved. The case for legislative devolution should be reviewed within 10 years.
The All Wales Youth Offending Strategy is published by the Welsh Assembly Government and the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, and is available at: http://wales.gov.uk/dsjlg/publications/commmunitysafety/youthoffendingstrategy/strategye?lang=en The report of the Silk Commission, Empowerment and Responsibility: Legislative Powers to Strengthen Wales, is available at: http://commissionondevolutioninwales.independent.gov.uk/files/2014/03/Empowerment-Responsibility-Legislative-Powers-to-strengthen-Wales.pdf
Almost Two Thirds of Youth Conference Plans in Northern Ireland Completed within Six Months
The Youth Justice (Northern Ireland) Act 2002 introduced the current statutory framework for youth justice in Northern Ireland. Based on restorative principles, the system is largely focused around youth conferencing which can function as a diversionary disposal, providing an alternative to court, or, following prosecution, as a court-ordered mechanism for determining the content of the sentence.
According to figures published by the Youth Justice Agency, in 2012/13 there were 1556 referrals for youth conferencing, 77 per cent of which resulted in a ratified plan that was completed (five per cent of referrals were still in process). There has been a downward trend since a peak in 2010/11 of almost one quarter and the number of referrals was lower in 2012/13 than at any time since 2007/8, the first full year of operation.
Although both forms of conferencing have declined, court-ordered referrals have done so at a faster rate. In 2008/9, 52 per cent of conferences were diversionary; by 2012/13, that figure had risen to 55 per cent. The number of community orders imposed by the court – attendance centre orders, community responsibility orders and reparation orders – has also fallen. In combination with the proportionate decline in court-ordered conferencing, this indicates a shift towards pre-court disposals. By contrast, admissions to the Juvenile Justice Centre, the Youth Justice Agency’s custodial facility, have remained stable. In 2012/13, there were 551 ‘transactions’ (admissions or changes in legal status) within the Centre compared to 545 the previous year and 551 the year before that. Custodial outcomes as a proportion of children coming into the court system have acccordingly risen.
In 2011, the Northern Ireland youth justice system was subject to a generally favourable review. Two areas of concern, however, stood out: first the extent of delay from referral for a youth conference to ratification of the plan; second, there was a question as to whether conference outcomes resulted in disproportionate levels of intervention for minor offending. The latest figures demonstrate improvements in both of these areas.
In relation to the former, one of the anomalies noted by the review was that delays associated with diversionary conferences were greater than for those which were court-ordered. While this is still true, the gap has narrowed considerably in the past two years, leading to an overall reduction in time from referral to plan ratification, as demonstrated in Table 5.
Time from referral for youth conferencing to plan ratification.
Over the same period, there has been a decrease in the average length of plan from 548 days in 2007/08 to 483 days in 2012/13. Such a trend might be anticipated given the shift to diversionary conferencing. However the reduction would appear to be equally sharp for court-ordered interventions. In the former year, 47 per cent of diversionary plans were completed within six months compared with just 28 per cent of court-directed conferences. In 2012/13, the equivalent figures were 63 and 42 per cent respectively.
Youth Justice Agency Annual Workload Statistics 2012/13,by M Decodts and N O’Neill, is available at: www.youthjusticeagencyni.gov.uk/document_uploads/SB_1_2014_-_YJA_Annual_Workload_Statistics_2012-13.PDF A Review of the Youth Justice System in Northern Ireland, by John Graham, Stella Perrott and Kathleen Marshall, is available at: www.dojni.gov.uk/index/publications/publication-categories/pubs-criminal-justice/review-of-youth-justice—large-print-version-of-report.pdf
Routine Strip Searching of Children in Young Offender Institutions in England and Wales Comes to an End
The practice of routinely strip searching children when they enter custody, and following visits, has been subject to extensive criticism. A 2006 inquiry by Lord Carlile into the use of restraint within the secure estate drew attention to the fact that one of the first experiences of children arriving at a custodial institution was ‘to be asked to strip and reveal their bodies to an unknown adult’. Figures supplied by one young offender institution (YOI) at the time indicated that 3379 strip searches had been undertaken at reception over a six month period. It was not clear whether any prescribed articles had been found. The secure training centre (STC) rules provided for strip searching in a manner consistent with that in YOIs, although the inquiry noted that in practice children were generally provided with dressing gowns. Practice was more variable in secure children’s homes (SCH) since there was no national guidance covering these establishments. While some homes conducted searching on reception as in other types of custodial institution, one home never used strip searches as it was considered unnecessary to do so. The inquiry concluded that strip searching was coercive, demeaning, distressing, and unnecessary for the purposes of ensuring good order and discipline.
More recently, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons’ annual report was critical of what it termed ‘the pointless strip searching’ of all children at the point of admission, questioning whether the volume of searches was merited by the number of prescribed items found. A Freedom of Information request reported by The Guardian newspaper indicated that 43,960 strip searches were conducted in the secure estate for children and young people in the 21 months to December 2012. Only 275 of these revealed illicit items, most commonly tobacco, and there were no recorded discoveries of drugs or knives.
In June 2013, Jeremy Wright, Minister with responsibility for youth justice, confirmed in a letter to the Howard League that routine strip searching in SCHs and STCs has been discontinued and that that a pilot of risk-informed searching was to be conducted in YOIs. Following successful piloting at Werrington and Parc YOIs, the Ministry of Justice issued a Prison Service Instruction confirming that from 5 May 2014 full strip searches should only be carried out ‘on a risk-led basis, on intelligence or reasonable suspicion that contraband is concealed on the person’.
An independent inquiry into the use of physical restraint, solitary confinement and forcible strip searching of children in prisons, secure training centres and local authority secure children’s homes, by Lord Carlile of Berriew, is available at: https://d19ylpo4aovc7m.cloudfront.net/fileadmin/howard_league/user/pdf/Publications/Carlile_Report_pdf.pdf HM Chief Inspector of Prisons’ Annual Report 2012–2013 is available at: www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/publications/corporate-reports/hmi-prisons/hm-inspectorate-prisons-annual-report-2012-13.pdf Results from the Freedom of Information request is reported in ‘Children in custody pilot scheme could bring end to strip-searching’, by Eric Allison. The article appears in The Guardian newspaper and is available at: www.theguardian.com/society/2013/aug/16/children-in-custody-strip-searching The Minister’s letter to the Howard League on ‘Full searching in the youth secure estate, 7 June 2013’, is available at: www.cypnow.co.uk/digital_assets/Letter_to_Frances_Crook_-_Full_searching_in_the_youth_secure_estate.pdf Revised searching policy for young people, Prison Service Instruction 16/2014, is available at: www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/offenders/psipso/psi-2014/psi-16-2014-searching-young-people.pdf
Educational Attainment in Secure Children’s Homes in England and Wales Surpasses Government Expectations
Secure children’s homes (SCHs) are the smallest of the three types of institutions in England and Wales for children remanded or sentenced to custody, the other two being secure training centres (STCs) and young offender institutions (YOIs). The former also have higher staff to child ratios and, as a consequence, are more expensive than the other two types of institution. In 2013/14, the average sector, per capita, annual placement cost for a SCH was £209,000 compared with £187,000 for a STC and £60,000 for a YOI. Such price differentials are reflected in the Youth Justice Board’s placement strategy with SCHs reserved exclusively for the youngest and most vulnerable children. In February 2014, two thirds of all children in custody were placed in YOIs, 22 per cent in STCs, and just 11 per cent in SCHs.
In recent years, the number of children imprisoned has declined sharply, leading to a reduction in custodial capacity, representing savings to the exchequer of £76 million since 2010. As part of that process – while there has been no decommissioning of STC provision between 2010/11 and 2013/14 – the number of youth justice places available in SCHs has fallen by 32, equivalent to one quarter of the SCH custodial population at February 2014.
As previously reported in Youth Justice News, 1 the government’s Transforming Youth Custody agenda involves a reconfiguration of the existing secure estate to put ‘education at the heart of detention’. The proposals involve the development of a network of ‘secure colleges’ that would replace all YOI and STC provision, and would, by implication, reduce further the number of children placed in SCHs. The government has confirmed that per capita cost savings are an integral part of the secure college model which would be achieved through economies of scale: the ‘pathfinder’ secure college will be large, holding 320 children. In a response to the Chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights in March 2014, Chris Grayling, Minister of Justice, acknowledged that a number of stakeholders have argued that smaller establishments allow for increased contact time between staff and young people but the government was not aware of any research considering the links between the size of an establishment, contact time between staff and young people, and outcomes.
There are nonetheless grounds for concern about the suitability of large facilities for the detention of children. Of the 33 children who have died in penal custody since 1990, all but two were placed in the largest type of custodial institution (YOI) and none in the smallest (SCH). An inquest that concluded in April 2014 into the death of Jake Hardy, a 17 year-old boy who hanged himself in Hindley YOI in January 2012, after seven weeks in the establishment, found that a ‘catalogue of shocking failures’ had contributed to his suicide. Jake was a vulnerable boy who had been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and had a statement of special educational needs. A report confirming that Jake had a history of self-harm was provided to Hindley but was not entered into his records. Jake’s repeated complaints to staff, supported on one occasion by his youth offending team worker, that he was being bullied were insufficiently investigated. Jake’s mother had also informed the unit that her son was contemplating suicide and as late as 19 January 2012, a governor who had spoken to Jake ‘expressed serious concerns about his state of mind and well-being’. A complaint form found in his cell after his death recorded Jake’s distress at the failure to alleviate the constant bullying. In the section asking what remedy the complainant would like, Jake had entered: ‘To see the staff do their job properly’. In this context, it is significant that a 2008 review of safeguarding arrangements in the secure estate, conducted for the Youth Justice Board, found a relationship between establishment size and children’s sense of security. Children in YOIs felt least safe, those in SCHs most safe, with those in STCs somewhere in between. The report explained the findings in the following terms: A major reason for this difference is the size of the establishments and the relative staffing ratios…. The smaller the establishment, the better staff could get to know the young people in their care, making it easier to care for them in a holistic way.
In terms of education, which the government maintains is key to its vision for the secure estate, there is again evidence that smaller facilities are better placed to generate more favourable outcomes. SCHs deliver 30 hours of education with enrichment activities in the evenings and at weekends; by contrast, YOIs provide 15 hours of education a week supplemented by 10 hours of purposeful activity, while STCs offer 25 hours of education with five hours enrichment.
A recent study suggests that, within SCHs, progress in children’s educational attainment surpasses, by some margin, government expectations. National student attainment requirements are expressed in Qualification and Curriculum Authority points and the government targets entail an improvement of 0.3 points per four week period. The average improvement per month for children within SCHs, often from a very low baseline given the poor previous educational history of the children involved, was 0.91 for English and 0.97 for maths. The study also found that on average children’s reading age increased by one year after eight weeks stay in an SCH.
Per capita costs of secure institutions are given by Jeremy Wright, Minister with responsibility for youth justice in answer to a Parliamentary question reported at Hansard, House of Commons, 27 June 2013, column 368W. The distribution of the youth custodial population by placement type is given at Youth Custody Report – February 2014, published by the Ministry of Justice and available at: www.gov.uk/government/publications/youth-custody-data Figures on the savings generated by the fall in child custody are given by Jeremy Wright in answer to a Parliamentary question reported at Hansard, House of Commons, 4 March 2014, column 810W. Information on the reduction of capacity in secure children’s homes is given by Jeremy Wright in answer to a Parliamentary question reported at Hansard, House of Commons, 17 March 2014, column 445W. Chris Grayling’s response to the Joint Committee on Human Rights is contained in Criminal Justice and Courts Bill – Part 2, letter to Dr Hywell Francis MP, Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, 31 March 2014. Figures on child deaths in penal custody are given by Inquest and are available at: www.inquest.org.uk/pdf/Deaths_of_Children_in_Penal_Custody_1990-date.pdf Details on the inquest into Jake Hardy’s death are given in a press release issued by Inquest on 4 April 2014, ‘Jury rules catalogue of shocking failures led to preventable death of 17 year-old Jake Hardy at Hindley prison’, available at: www.inquest.org.uk/media/pr/jury-rules-failures-preventable-death-17-year-old-jake-hardy-hindley-prison A Review of Safeguarding in the Secure Estate 2008 is published by the Youth Justice Board and is available at: www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/youth-justice/improving-practice/AReviewofSafeguardingintheSecureEstate2008FullReport.pdf Data on education progress in SCHs are given in ‘They Helped Me, They Supported Me.’ Achieving Outcomes and Value for Money in Secure Children’s Homes, by Justice Studio. The report is published by the Secure Accommodation Network and is available at: www.securechildrenshomes.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/SAN-28-April-2014-Executive-summary.pdf