The Youth offending Service in North Lincolnshire is now judged to be one of the top performing teams in the country.
John Drew, the Chief Executive of the Youth Justice Board (YJB) for England and Wales has recognised this achievement saying:
“I would like to offer my congratulations on your outstanding re-inspection result on the Core Case Inspection, which can only be a testament to a huge volume of excellent work to turn things around. The results put your YOT in the top five per cent performance bracket nationally, and to have achieved this in such a short time and from such a low starting point is really impressive.”
The YJB is now “keen to learn lessons from this ...and “explore ways in which we can showcase North Lincolnshire’s achievement on a wider stage. “
In making this progress - the Management Board and Youth Offending Team have worked tirelessly over the past year to turn things around and provide a service that we can celebrate and be proud of.
The actions taken to improve our performance have included the appointment of a new Youth Offending management team who have introduced a number of measures including:
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Comprehensive training and robust supervision for all youth justice workers
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Quality assurance and audit programmes, including peer inspection by colleagues from across the Yorkshire and Humber region
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New procedures and protocols for the Youth Offending Service and its partner agencies
All of this has been led and overseen by a strong, committed multi-agency Management Board that has driven progress and supported the staff to implement the changes and most importantly to improve outcomes for our children. Throughout this period, the key players have demonstrated unstinting commitment to reducing Youth Crime in North Lincolnshire. The results speak for themselves.
We now have far fewer young people offending, less young people re-offending, and greater numbers of young people engaged in positive community based activities. The report published today recognises this, highlighting examples of good practice now being applied across the service - making sure that we continue getting our young people back on track and making North Lincolnshire a safer and better place.
Cllr Rob Waltham, cabinet member for adult and children’s services at North Lincolnshire Council, said:
“Obviously we are extremely delighted with the results. What a major turnaround from just over a year ago. We have worked extremely hard with our partners - health, police, probation, the regional youth justice board, and youth offending board.
“It has been a challenging journey for everyone involved. I want to thank staff for helping drive the improvements forward and persevering. They have been instrumental in producing these fantastic results.”
