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The link between alcohol abuse and youth offending is only just receiving the scrutiny it deserves, reports Anabel Unity Sale

There were vigorous nods of agreement among professionals working in youth justice last October when Anne Owers, the chief inspector of prisons, acknowledged something they had known for a long time: “Alcohol for many of the young people going to prisons is as great a driver of their offending as drugs.”

Days before Owers’ remarks, a prisons inspectorate report into Castington young offender institution revealed that 42 per cent of its inmates thought they would have an alcohol problem when they were released. Given statistics like this it is hardly surprising that the correlation between excessive alcohol consumption and criminal behaviour is well known.

However, some believe alcohol’s role in youth offending is sometimes overlooked. Tim Bateman, senior policy development officer at crime reduction charity Nacro, says: “There is a tendency when comparing drugs and alcohol together to regard drugs as a bigger problem for young people, because adult culture accepts drinking without looking at its results.”

If a young person is drinking cider with their friends in the park they may be seen as “experimenting”, which might not be the case if they were smoking crack. While one activity can be dismissed as part of growing up, the other sounds alarm bells.

This may be because defining an “alcohol problem” is not easy. Richard Phillips, acting chief executive of Alcohol Concern, says alcohol dependency problems are unusual in young people, and that most young offenders will not need specific alcohol detoxification treatment. Bateman adds that, unless there is a pattern of alcohol-related offending, it can be difficult to present the issue to a young person as a problem they need to address.

Although there are no official statistics on how many in the youth justice system misuse alcohol, the Youth Justice Board’s (YJB) head of policy for health and substance misuse, Bill Kerslake, says alcohol is second only to cannabis among substances consumed by young offenders.

If a young offender receives a custodial sentence, then any alcohol misuse, if it is part of polydrug use, can be picked up by the counselling, assessment, referral, advice and throughcare (Carat) services. These provide low-level intervention, with the creation of a care plan based on an offender’s specific needs. The service operates in all prisons for all ages. From April 2005 it will be replaced by the juvenile substance misuse service for prisoners under 18. There are 16 substance misuse managers employed in YOIs in England and Wales who are in the process of appointing 18 more staff.

If a young offender receives a community sentence they will be dealt with by their council’s youth offending team. Any alcohol or drug misuse by offenders is picked up by a performance indicator introduced last April. Created by the YJB with the National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse, the performance indicator dictates that a team screens all young people for all substances, and that those with identified needs receive a specialist assessment within five working days. If the young person does misuse substances, they should be able to access the appropriate treatment services within 10 working days.

Each youth offending team has a substance misuse worker who identifies what part substances play in the life of the young offender. This worker can devise ways to help the young person, including directing them to specialist agencies.

Each of the four secure training centres in England has a substance misuse manager. And the 15 local authority secure homes have received more funding to bring in sessional workers to look at alcohol, drug and substance misuse.


While all this activity sounds commendable, is it enough to tackle the problem?  Kerslake is willing to admit that the focus in the past has been on drug rather than alcohol use, while adding: “The reality is young people use drugs and alcohol in tandem.”

Phillips says: “I don’t think there is a single prison that has adequate provision to support prisoners with alcohol problems and it’s pretty unlikely that YOIs do either.”

With this in mind, Alcohol Concern has recently worked with the Prison Service to develop a best practice guide on how to manage people who misuse alcohol. The guidance has yet to be allocated funding to roll it out, but Phillips believes its basic premise can be adapted by YOIs.

Addressing a young offender’s alcohol misuse when they first enter the youth justice system is the ideal opportunity. But as Kerslake says: “There is no point in tackling alcohol without tackling the wider social issues, because it will have little effect.” CC

•  Community Care’s Back on Track campaign aims to improve the lot of young offenders in custody and to reduce the number of children and young people given custodial sentences.

good practice in sunderland

Julie Wardell manages the youth drug and alcohol project for Sunderland Council’s social services department. Known as Y-Dap, it comprises eight staff from education, health, social services, a voluntary sector agency and Sunderland’s youth offending service (YOS). This month, the team will be joined by a dedicated trainer, funded by Sunderland primary care trust, who will train staff in working with various professionals around a young person’s drug and alcohol use.

Y-Dap began life in April this year and started receiving referrals in May before being launched officially  in June. In its first three months it saw 75 under-18 year olds, 33 of these referrals being due to alcohol-related concerns. During 2003 Sunderland’s YOS were referred 64 young people, 21 of these for alcohol problems.

Wardell says: “Our treatment service looks at what the young person is drinking now – how many units a week – and what problems this is causing them. We get them to keep an alcohol diary, to assess whether they need to detox and to set goals. A goal might be if they are drinking 100 units a week to get it down to 90 the next week.”

She believes the initiative works because all staff are encouraged to work with clients in a structured way. Young people attend Y-Dap voluntarily and work through several specific sessions over whatever period they need. Wardell says young people without very complex problems tend to complete six sessions.

The project has become more young people-friendly, thanks to money given to the scheme by Sunderland’s drug action team, which has enabled it to buy a Playstation and a pool table. “Young people can come here and play pool and have a chat with us at the same time,” says Wardell.