Back on Track: Aims and Objectives

OVERALL
AIM                                                                                  

Community Care is campaigning for a dramatic reduction
in the number of children and young people being held in custody
and calling for the greater use of community sentences instead.  We
urge that custody is only ever used as a last resort and for the
shortest possible length of time.

SPECIFIC AIMS

Ensuring human rights

• To insist that the treatment of children and young people in
  custody conforms to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of
  the Child
• To bring an end to degrading and humiliating practices in young
  offender institutions such as routine strip searching and
  inappropriate use of control and restraint
• To end the practice of remanding children and young people in
  adult prisons
• To raise the age of criminal responsibility (currently 10) to
  bring it in line with other European countries

Getting back on track

• To promote the use of community initiatives such as Youth
  Inclusion Projects to minimise the risk of offending and support
  children and young people on their release from custody
• To increase the provision of services both in custody and in
  the community, for children and young people who offend and who are
  in need of treatment for mental health problems or problematic drug
  and alcohol use
• To reduce self-harm and suicides among children and young
  people in custody by encouraging more involvement of social workers
  and removing from prisons those vulnerable young people who are
  most at risk from self-harm and suicide
• To urge the Government to ensure that the resources allocated
  to providing access to a social worker in young offender
  institutions are being properly administered

Improving policies across the board

• To call for an improvement in training of staff working in
  young offender institutions to ensure they are properly equipped to
  help vulnerable children and young people
• To ensure that the prison service order on educational
  provision is honoured in every establishment, not just the
  best
• To call for youth justice to come under the remit of the DfES
  along with other children’s services
• To ensure that no fifteen or sixteen year olds assessed as
  vulnerable are sent to YOIs.  If places are unavailable in Secure
  Training Centres or Local Authority Secure Children’s Homes,
  their sentences should be deferred