News

Sure Start spreads its wings

The Sure Start Unit has begun working with a small group of local authorities with the aim of extending the approach to more children.

At present the initiative will only reach one-third of the children under four living in poverty in England, but the local authority project will examine whether Sure Start's style of working can be used more widely at little or no extra cost. Sure Start Unit head Naomi Eisenstadt said that lessons already learned would be important considerations. These included the longer time than originally anticipated to get projects off the ground, difficulties with partnership working and the sharing of power by agencies. She also acknowledged the crucial role of parental and community involvement.

Alarm at youth crime figures

Community action may help to reduce crime levels in schools, according to the authors of a report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

Nearly half of secondary school pupils in England, Scotland and Wales have broken the law, says a survey of 14,000 secondary school students carried out for the report.

Almost a quarter of 15 and 16-year-olds said they had carried a knife or other weapon during the past year and nearly a fifth admitted attacking someone. Vandalism, shoplifting and small-scale property crimes were committed by a large minority of girls and boys. This type of offending peaked among 14 and 15-year-olds.

A quarter of 13 and 14-year-olds said they had recently drunk five or more alcoholic drinks in a single session.

Communities that Care chief executive Barry Anderson, who co-wrote the report, said the survey showed the potential for community schemes to prevent antisocial behaviour by tackling the underlying risk factors. He described the findings on violence as "particularly worrying".

Youth at Risk? From www.jrf.org.uk

Government ups police involvement at schools

A series of clampdowns on bad behaviour in schools is set to bring expanded learning support units, electronic registration to pick up on truancy, and closer links with local police forces.

Education secretary Estelle Morris has announced £66m to fund the measures, which will also include "intensive truancy sweeps" involving education welfare staff with Connexions personal advisers working to keep those caught truanting in school. Other measures include full-time education for excluded pupils and behaviour and education support teams to intervene early to prevent bad behaviour and tackle its causes.

The initiative will be reinforced by the new school police protocol. Up to 100 extra police officers are to be based in schools by this autumn in 10 crime areas.

Home office backs anti-drugs pilot

A pilot drug-testing scheme designed to break the link between drugs and crime is set to be expanded into six new areas, the Home Office has said. Compulsory drug tests for offenders charged with drug-related or theft offences are being extended to Bedford, Blackpool, Doncaster, Torquay, Wirral and Wrexham.

The scheme, intended to ensure that problem drug users are identified early and are offered treatment, already runs in Hackney, Nottingham and Staffordshire. Drug tests will be given only to those already charged with an offence. "Overall, crime is falling but class A drug misuse continues to fuel a significant amount of property crime," said drugs minister Bob Ainsworth.

Youth Justice Board gets more funds to intensify community supervision

A more robust approach to community remand and sentencing has been flagged up for young offenders as part of a government crackdown on crime. It will result in 600 new places on intensive supervision and surveillance programmes.

The Youth Justice Board has been given £6.5m to establish more ISSPs over the next five months, as well as increase the number of places on existing schemes. A total of 3,500 places on ISSPs will now be available each year as the scheme is extended to a further 33 youth offending teams in England and Wales.

The expansion is part of a Home Office initiative to plough more money into the 10 police force areas worst affected by street crime. Funding of £67m has been made available for tackling street crime and a further £194m will provide more prison places and measures to deal with youth crime.

ISSPs maintain surveillance of young offenders through tracking, electronic tagging, or voice verification. They initially involve around 25 hours' contact time a week, including a package of education, offending behaviour programmes, reparation to victims, and family support.

The scheme will now embrace all outer London boroughs, as well as Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall, Avon and Somerset, Wolverhampton, Nottinghamshire, and Thames Valley.

Manchester, Merseyside, Lancashire, South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire are already covered.

Measures of poverty under review

The government is consulting on proposals to change the measure of child poverty. The move came after the government was criticised for falling short of its target by removing only 500,000 children from poverty in its first term, half the number expected.

Children are usually considered to be living in poverty if they are in households with incomes below 60 per cent of the median average after housing costs, but the Department for Work and Pensions has put forward four other options for consideration:

Option 1: continuing the indicators of low income, "worklessness", educational attainment, health inequalities, and housing standards.

Option 2: a child poverty index created by weighting each of the indicators in option 1.

Option 3: calculated by combining relative low income and material deprivation.

Option 4: a core set of low income and "consistent poverty" indicators.