‘Dangerous’ young offender institutions should be shut down, children’s commissioner says
Detaining children in custody should never be a “waiting room” for people whose real needs are care, accommodation or mental health support, England’s Children’s Commissioner has warned.
Although government figures reveal a 3 per cent drop in the number of children in custody to 430 by March 2024 – the lowest figure on record – Dame Rachel de Souza’s concerns remain.
The Commissioner publicly called for the gradual closure of all young offender institutions, advocating their replacement with a new youth justice system “based primarily on a rehabilitative model of care”.
Giving her annual Longford lecture on Tuesday evening, Dame Rachel is expected to warn that detaining children will destroy their innocence and from that point on they will essentially be told they are guilty.
Its new report on the issue cited government data showing that in the year ending March 2024, almost two-thirds (62 per cent) of children in youth care were not sentenced to prison.
More than a quarter (28 percent) of children who were not given a detention sentence and were already incarcerated while awaiting trial were acquitted or their cases were dismissed, while 72 percent were given sentences other than imprisonment.
Dame Rachel said in her report: “Last year, 441 children in custody awaiting trial were not given prison sentences.
“The cases of the other 168 children were completely rejected.
“These are not harmless delays.
“Even a short period of detention can cause serious harm to the child.
“From disrupting education, separating them from their families and communities, and sometimes reinforcing vulnerabilities that bring them into contact with the justice system.
“This experience leaves a mark that will last long after their release.”
The commissioner’s office said that despite a decline in detention over the past decade, the average length of time children are detained in custody has risen by 89 per cent since 2013/14 to 125 nights over four months in 2021/22.
Dame Rachel’s office said more than one in 10 (14%) detention cases were longer than 182 days, which was longer than both the 56-day detention period at the magistrates’ court and the 182-day cap at the crown court.
Although he says adjustments have been made to the system over the years, he is proposing fundamental change and is expected to call for all young offender institutions to eventually be closed in his speech.
Dame Rachel said children had been let down, adding: “By failing to provide moral leadership and show them what it means to be a child today.
“We have left a gap in the services children need and in the moral and social fabric of our country.
“We left it to the children to fill it out.
“We have retreated from our moral duty to these children.
“And then we are surprised when they fall.
“What we should be judged on is how we treat these kids.”
He will warn that if a child is detained, “it often means that countless chances have been missed” and that a sense of complacency has developed in this group: “We treated it like a war that had been won.
“We reduced the number of children in custody to a few hundred rather than a few thousand.”
Dame Rachel adds: “With secure schooling we have fine-tuned custody patterns, but we have not changed the basic approach to locking up children.
“We can’t stop in the last 400.
“We must close all young offender institutions.”
Its report notes that children from black and mixed backgrounds are over-represented in detention, “highlighting how bias can influence every step of their experience in the youth justice system”.
He wrote: “Detention is the most extreme intervention the state can make in a child’s life and may be necessary in a very small number of serious cases.
“But this is not, and should never be, a waiting room for children whose primary need is care, shelter or mental health support.
“Or, as one sandbox worker aptly described it, ‘a pointless production line.’
Its report proposes “an ambitious national reform that redesigns the secure care system to prioritize treating children who offend first and foremost as children in need of special support.”
Dame Rachel argued that “attempts to reform an unsatisfactory youth justice system that fails to meet the complex needs of these children should no longer be pursued.”
He said a new youth justice system “should be based primarily on a rehabilitative model of care developed by the DfE (Department for Education) and NHS England, together with an improved education and engagement offer”.
He highlighted the need for “smaller, no-frills settings close to where children live” and said there needed to be “a clear, time-bound plan to phase out all young offender institutions and secure education centres”.
The government has been contacted for comment.
