Youth Offending Team
Group Manager - Tom Whitworth
Somerset Youth Offending Team works with partner organisations, to provide a high standard of service delivery to children and young people.
Recent achievments include the development of preventive work by YOT with the establishment of four Youth Inclusion Support Panels across the county, the joint work on anti-social behaviour and the continuing success of the Restorative Justice in Schools and Residential Units Project. The level of compliance with National Standards in Youth Justice for Final Warnings, community penalties and young people remanded or sentenced to custody was audited for the first time by the Youth Justice Board in October-December 2004. It is pleaseing to note the low numbers of young people who are detained in custody either on remand or sentence as well as the Team’s success in meeting the challenge to provide a consistent level of regular contact and interventions across a rural county despite the pressures this presents.
One of the key performance measures set by the Youth Justice Board is for recidivism (reducing re-offending). This has also been one of a series of indicators chosen as part of Somerset County Council’s Public Service Agreement (PSA). It was agreed with the Youth Justice Board and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister that Somerset YOT would achieve a greater reduction in overall offending by young people looking at all penalty types added together. For 2004/5 the target was a 5% (7% PSA) reduction for young people offending over a 2-3 year period. It is very good news that Somerset YOT has achieved the targets both for the Youth Justice Board and the County Council PSA.
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