Barnsley Youth Justice Service (YJS) has received an overall rating of ‘Good’ following an inspection by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation.

Chief Inspector of Probation, Justin Russell said “Barnsley Youth Justice Service is making considerable efforts to deter children away from crime, and this is particularly successful in their supervision of children who have been sentenced by court to community orders. However, we want to see more consistency in the work delivered with children who are receiving less formal intervention, through out-of-court disposals.”

Staff at Barnsley Youth Justice Service are committed and passionate about their work and determined to improve the lives of children under their supervision. This has resulted in the development of strong relationships with partners, and we found some excellent examples of partner agencies working together effectively to support children and their families. The service thinks carefully about what services could improve the prospects of each child and there was a consistent focus on understanding and supporting children’s diverse needs across all elements of practice.

We were particularly impressed with how the service manages resettlement – when a child is released from custody – which we rated separately as ‘Outstanding’. A child’s needs and their safety were balanced carefully with assessments to identify any risk they may pose to the public and we found good use of multi-agency meetings to help manage children’s risk to others.

This inspection made six recommendations, including that Barnsley Youth Justice Service should work with South Yorkshire Police to improve the management of children being dealt with outside the court system (known as out-of-court disposals). We found this area of their work to be inconsistent, despite this making up the majority of their caseload, and they need to focus better on supporting children and protecting the local community.

 Notes to editor

1. This service works with children aged 10 to 17. The YJS supervise children with complex needs and some in the care of the local authority.
2. The Inspectorate uses a four-point scale: ‘Outstanding’, ‘Good’, ‘Requires improvement’ and ‘Inadequate’, rating specific aspects of each service and giving an overall rating.
3. The inspection looked at standards of organisational delivery (leadership, staffing and facilities), their management of children serving court sentences (court disposals) and children serving cautions or community sentences (out-of-court disposals). We also inspected the quality of resettlement work which was rated as ‘Outstanding’.
4. The report is available on HM Inspectorate of Probation website: 00:01 19 July 2023.
5. HM Inspectorate of Probation is the independent inspector of youth offending and probation services across England and Wales.
6. Fieldwork for this inspection took place in April 2023.
7. For media enquiries, please contact Head of Communications media@hmiprobation.gov.uk (E-mail address)