An inspection of Kirklees Youth Justice Service (YJS), by HM Inspectorate of Probation, has given the service an overall rating of ‘Requires improvement’.

The Inspectorate uses a four-point scale: ‘Outstanding’, ‘Good’, ‘Requires improvement’ and ‘Inadequate’. The Inspectorate rates specific aspects of each service and also gives an overall rating.

Kirklees YJS works with children aged 10 to 17 who are serving court sentences (court disposals) or who have received cautions or community resolutions (out-of-court disposals). The majority of children under their supervision are aged 15 to 17 (71 per cent), male (91 per cent) and white (65 per cent).

Chief Inspector of Probation Justin Russell said: “Kirklees YJS has been through a period of instability and significant challenge, including a restructuring and the Covid-19 pandemic, and this is reflected in our ratings. Although staff and managers want to deliver a quality service for the children they work with, we found shortfalls in practice in a number of areas that this service needs to urgently focus on to improve.”

The inspection highlighted improvements are particularly required in work with children who have received community resolutions (out-of-court disposals), where less than half the cases we looked at were satisfactory. Inspectors drew attention to the inconsistent involvement the YJS has in joint-working panels – where decisions are made as to what type of out-of-court disposal a child receives – and has advised the service should be sharing information and their recommendations to these panels more effectively.

Mr Russell continued: “The reason we focus on areas like community resolutions is that they indicate how well a service is assessing a child and managing their needs, at the earliest opportunity, as well as the risk of harm that child poses to themselves and others. There are shortfalls in the quality of work undertaken by Kirklees YJS in this specific area. It’s important we draw attention to these for the benefit of the service, children under their supervision, and the wider public.”

The inspection report notes that the reason for some of Kirklees YJS’s shortcomings weren’t helped by low staffing levels, which has had an impact on the quality of service they are able to deliver, although inspectors noted that recruitment had recently improved.

Mr Russell added: “Training for staff at Kirklees YJS is comprehensive but learning and development must to be more consistent and address the needs of all staff. However, this has not impacted staff in terms of their ability to develop supportive and meaningful relationships with children under their supervision. There is a motivational attitude which I see as being key to the service’s continued improvement.”

In this report, the Inspectorate makes recommendations that will enable Kirklees YJS to make important improvements in its service for children who have offended. These include ensuring that management oversight and quality assurance of practice is more rigorous and effective, to implement plans and actions to reduce the over-representation of black and mixed heritage children, and improve the quality of assessment, planning and review for out-of-court and court disposals, specifically focusing on keeping the child safe and managing the risk of harm to others.

ENDS

Notes to editor

1. The report is available at justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprobation on 12 October 2021 00.01.
2. HM Inspectorate of Probation is the independent inspector of youth offending and probation services across England and Wales.
3. The Inspectorate uses a four-point scale: ‘Outstanding’, ‘Good’, ‘Requires improvement’ and ‘Inadequate’. The Inspectorate rates specific aspects of each service and also gives an overall rating.
4. Fieldwork for this inspection took place in June and July 2021.
5. For media enquiries, please contact Head of Communications Catherine Chan 07889 405930 or media@hmiprobation.gov.uk (E-mail address)