Reducing Criminalisation of Children and Young Adults in Residential Care: Evaluation of a Test of Change

Background

The disproportionate criminalisation of young people in residential care has been recognised by governments across the Western World for decades. Leading to over-representation within the criminal justice system, care-experience has become a criminogenic factor in the lives of thousands of young people. Police Scotland initiated the ‘Respect Programme’ across Greater Glasgow in 2020 to address these concerns and asked the Open University to evaluate the implementation and impact of the programme. The programme aimed to reduce the criminalisation of children and young people (CYP) in residential care by reducing police contact and processing of low threshold criminal behaviour and reporting of ‘missing’ episodes involving CYP in residential care. The key aims of the evaluation were to establish if robust evidence existed to justify further roll-out of the changes and to identify recommendations for further change or improvements to the current approach, if required.

Underpinning the approach was a new ‘not at home’ category to allow care establishments to address some missing persons without resorting to reporting to police; an approved change to Scottish Crime Recording Standards was introduced to provide police with greater discretion not to record low-level criminal acts and/or to give care establishments the opportunity to resolve incidents without involving police; and a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between Police Scotland and the City’s residential children’s houses to guide care workers decisions about calling police, and to inform police and care staff actions when children go missing.

The evaluation of the Respect pilot drew on evidence from prior pilots of the (initially separate) ‘missing’ and ‘reducing criminalisation’ protocols; reviewed relevant UK and international literature; analysed police data and records from one children’s house where the Respect pilot was taking place; and reportied on a focus group involving police SPOCs (single points of contact) and care staff from children’s houses across Glasgow.

Summary of Findings

While all calls for service to the police by care establishments are based on important safeguarding considerations, the evidence confirmed that frequent police contact can lead to stereotyping and discrimination of some children. This evaluation provides broad support for the Respect programme and some early indicators of success, including advantages arising from the role of specialist police liaison officers, and evidence that a more proportionate police response to children going missing from care was being achieved. However, findings warned of the difficulties in achieving consistency among care workers and police which can exacerbate tensions between them. Significantly, it was unclear whether the programme was meeting the needs of the minority of individuals who were behind most police callouts to children’s homes (repeat missing persons/offenders).

Comparison of the police data and data provided by House A provided some contradictions (e.g. opposing ratios of missing versus criminal incidents) but this may have reflected the significant impact one or two prolific missing or offending individuals can have on the experiences of different houses. Moreover, the more detailed House A data suggested that there was still a need for police reassurance to use the ‘not at home’ category, or different views on its definition, remained. On the other hand, increasing confidence in dealing in-house with challenging behaviour was evident, with police called only to more serious incidents and few of these resulting in further action.

A number of recommendations were offered for consideration prior to national rollout which fell broadly under three headings (Re-drafting the protocol, governance and monitoring, and training/communication):-

Re-drafting the protocol

The protocol should be re-written and reduced in scope, including:-
- Removal of children in foster care from the protocol,
- Flexibility to address incidents on a case-by-case basis - not excluding repeat missing persons/offenders, not excluding incidents taking place outside of the premises.
The refreshed protocol should be based on a set of principles rather than rigid criteria and procedures.
Frequency of SPOC contact, including social contact and visits to review recent incidents, should be agreed with each children’s house depending on the frequency/severity of problems, and re-assessed when significant resident/staff changes occur. All SPOCs should commit to at least one social visit per month, even when no incidents are reported.
Some children’s houses may want to retain local arrangements and autonomy.

Governance and monitoring

Police and children’s services leaders must provide good governance and underline the need for a consistent approach while acknowledging the challenges faced by officers and staff.
A new strategic governance group should oversee implementation of the rollout and on-going monitoring.
Partnership involvement should be broadened to include a wider range of partners, such as health (especially mental health), and community safety partnerships.
The programme doesn’t reduce the number of the calls to police per se but does improve outcomes. As such, it’s important to avoid inflexible data measurements of success/failure of the programme.
Bringing young people into contact with police/building relationships on an informal basis reduces future issues, but it may also increase stop and search instances. This should be monitored as part of the governance of the programme.
The impact of the programme on children with protected or other characteristics should be monitored to ensure the impact is not disproportionate on some children.
A simple but consistent data collection tool should be used within children’s houses to capture relevant incidents and record outcomes to improve transparency and on-going evaluation. Compilation of the separate spreadsheets would be necessary to provide monitoring data to the governance group

Training/communication

The programme provides police with an opportunity to enhance their corporate parenting role, to detoxify relationships with young people in care, but the right officers need to be selected.
Multi-agency, in-person training should take place on a scheduled basis involving multi-agency input. Online training would not be appropriate; the essence of this programme is how we engage on a human level/soft skills level.
Consider training for police control room staff and response teams. Their responses must also be consistent.
Rather than a lengthy and wordy document, the protocol should be produced as an A4 sized poster or leaflet as an aide memoir for all officers and care staff.
Link other complementary approaches and training to the Respect programme e.g. ‘nurturing’ model and restorative approaches.
Consider how the Respect programme should be communicated to young people in care, and how it can benefit them, ensuring they have a voice to suggest improvements to the approaches being taken.

The research was carried out by Dr Shona Morrison from Policing Organisation and Practice within the Faculty of Business and Law within the Open University. The research was undertaken in collaboration with Police Scotland and Residential Care Home providers in the target area. Access the final reports.