Portsmouth Youth Offending Team (YOT) had worked hard to raise performance standards across the board, said Paul Wilson, Chief Inspector of Probation. Today he published the report of a recent joint inspection of the work of Portsmouth Youth Offending Team.

This joint inspection of youth offending work in Portsmouth is one of a small number of full joint inspections undertaken by HM Inspectorate of Probation with colleagues from the criminal justice, social care, education and health inspectorates. The inspection in Portsmouth was a re-inspection given that performance had shown poor outcomes for children and young people in 2013. Inspectors focused on six key areas: reducing reoffending, protecting the public, protecting children and young people, ensuring that the sentence is served, the effectiveness of governance and the delivery of interventions.

Inspectors were pleased to find that:

• work to reduce reoffending was satisfactory. Case managers provided relevant information to the courts, assessments demonstrated that they understood the reasons why children and young people offended, and the frequency and seriousness of offending had decreased;
• work to protect the public and actual or potential victims was satisfactory. Multi-agency arrangements were largely effective in the management of risk of harm work. The sharing of intelligence between the YOT police officer and case managers was progressive;
• protecting children and young people was good. Assessments and reviews were done well. Relationships with children’s social care services and the YOT were much improved. Management oversight had improved;
• work to ensure that the sentence was served was good. The YOT and its partners worked effectively to achieve positive outcomes for children and young people. Enforcement was managed well;
• the effectiveness of governance and partnership arrangements was satisfactory. The YOT Management Board had acted decisively to address the findings of the joint inspection in 2013. Performance data was being used to inform service delivery; and
• the management and delivery of interventions to reduce reoffending was satisfactory. The variety of reparation activities was not always meaningful to children and young people. One-to-one delivery of supervision with children and young people was impressive.

Inspectors made recommendations to assist the YOT to make continuing improvements, including: ensuring that planning for work to reduce reoffending is effective and that children and young people and parents/carers have a greater impact into these plans, and that child sexual exploitation should be covered as a standing item on the YOT Management Board agenda.
Paul Wilson said:

“We found that over the past 18 months, Portsmouth YOT and its partners had worked hard to raise performance standards. The improvements achieved were significant and in every criterion that was inspected, progress had been made. The YOT Management Board had set an ambitious improvement plan following the last inspection and this had required the full engagement of YOT staff and stakeholders. All had effectively risen to the challenge. The resilience shown was impressive and the platform for achieving better outcomes for children and young people had been laid.”

– ENDS –
NOTES TO EDITORS

1. The report is available at https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprobation/ from 2 September 2015.
2. The inspection programme of youth offending work, based on a risk-proportionate approach, was agreed by ministers in December 2011. Under this programme, full joint inspections are targeted primarily on areas where there are significant concerns about the effectiveness of youth offending work, based primarily on the three national youth justice indicators, supplemented by other measures, such as recent inspections. Occasional inspections are undertaken in areas that report high performance, in order to maintain a benchmark for good practice. Inspectors chose to re-inspect Portsmouth YOT because performance had shown poor outcomes for children and young people in 2013.
3. These inspections focus on issues not subject to other forms of external scrutiny: work to reduce offending and re-offending by young people; the management and minimisation of the risk of harm that a young person may pose to other people; safeguarding young people from harm (from their own actions and others); and work to ensure they serve their sentence.
4. There are four ratings which can be given: good, satisfactory, unsatisfactory and poor.
5. The inspections are led by HMI Probation, with participation by Ofsted, CQC and HMI Constabulary (and in Wales by the corresponding Welsh inspectorates, Healthcare Inspectorate Wales, Estyn and Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales).
6. For further information, please contact Jane Parsons at HM Inspectorate of Probation press office on 020 3681 2775 or 07880 787452.