Some people may already know that Joyce Moseley’s tenure as Chair of the Transition to Adulthood Alliance (T2A) after nine years in post has now come to an end. The Alliance and The Barrow Cadbury Trust would like to thank Joyce for her work supporting T2A and dedication she has shown to its work over the years.

 We can share the news that Leroy Logan MBE will be taking over. The experience he brings from his time in policing and founding a leading youth charity will be valuable to advancing the work of T2A. Leroy will be talking more about taking up this appointment in early 2022.

 But first let us hear from Joyce Moseley OBE, outgoing Chair, and former chief executive of Catch 22. She talks to Laurie Hunte, Criminal Justice programme manager at Barrow Cadbury Trust about how she was drawn to working with young people and her time as T2A Chair.

When did you become chair of T2A?

I have been chair for nine years beginning in 2012.

 What attracted you to the role?  What motivated your interest in criminal justice and young adults?

Where to start! The interest in young adults grew out of many years’ involvement with youth justice. As a social worker from 1968 onwards I was drawn to working with young offenders and their families. Labelling theory was strong and it did seem to me nonsensical how young people were being stigmatised for years to come for the most minor offences when it was plain to see that their difficult life circumstances were the things needing attention.

Later as a Director of Social Services I helped promote the needs of care leavers as more and more research showed how they fared badly in later life. This led to the Leaving Care Act which for the first time meant help and support could be given to those over 18 to help with the transition into adulthood.

But I did reflect that when I was a young social worker care leavers were not seen ‘as a problem’. Why? What had changed? Although similar problems probably befell them in later life the act of leaving care did not present problems – there were plenty of jobs for 16 year olds, renting a room was not difficult, the army used to recruit many care leavers and there did seem to be more community based social support networks (or is that rose tinted glasses?).

So society, the economy, support infrastructure, family structures all changed in the 70, 80 and 90s making the transition to adulthood that much more difficult for the kinds of young people finding themselves in the criminal justice system. Not so of course for those going onto higher education where student accommodation, welfare support, financial and social support was still strong. No one expected students to ‘behave like adults’.

In the late 90’s I became one of the founding members of the newly established Youth Justice Board. Having been a Director of Social Services I knew what little focus there was on young offenders in local authorities generally  – elected members’ interest and therefore budgets did not naturally fall on young offenders. So whilst it was controversial to split them off from the social welfare system and put them more firmly into the CJS it did bring a research, practice and policy focus on them and their needs which had not been so strong before.

What was your work and other experience leading up to that and what was the relevance of it to chairing T2A?

As well as social work training and management of social services I also trained as a community worker and undertook an MSc in Social Research. During my stint at the YJB I made a move into the voluntary sector and I following my interest in youth justice and became the CEO of the Royal Philanthropic Society. RPS had been the organisation that set up the first residential treatment centre for young offenders in 1832! Reading their records is such an eye opener – attitudes towards and understanding of the young people was often more caring and thoughtful than one sees today. RPS merged with the Rainer Foundation which had started the Probation Service in the second decade of the 20^th century eventually  becoming Rainer. Then there was a merger with Crime Concern, the charity that had developed much of the thinking around community safety, and Catch 22 was born where young adults were the central focus of the work.

RPS had a strong relationship with various European organisations that had shared the same philosophy back in the mid 19 century. King’s School, Canterbury, led by Rainer, and funded by ESF. In the early 2000s a European conference was held at Kings School, Canterbury, led by Rainer and funded by ESF, focused on young adults. We were very conscious of lagging behind in our thinking on this age group. Many of our European partners had both welfare and criminal justice systems that did not have the rigid dividing line at 18 that the UK had, enabling them to support young adults in those crucial years when, as we know now, they are still developing many of their cognitive skills. There was an important supporter of this conference – no other than Barrow Cadbury Trust. This proved to be the early beginnings of what became T2A in 2008.

One other influence was my time as a board director of the Tavistock Clinic NHS Foundation Trust known for its therapeutic approach to mental health. An adolescent department had been established back in the 1920’s. Adolescence had always been defined by the Tavistock as up to 25 for treatment purposes. They were early adopters of a  psychotherapeutic lens that regarded becoming an adult as a developmental process, something we now have neurological research to back up.

 Did you always know you wanted to work in this field?  If so why?

I’ve always been amazed when people say, ‘I have always known I wanted to be X or Y’. How did they know that? I have tended to fall into things without much planning! Getting into university was more luck than judgment and doing sociology at London was more to do with not having a modern language O level than much else. And what did one do with a sociology degree in those days – became a social worker to change the world!

So, no I did not have a plan although some fairly turbulent teenage years might have led me to respect and empathise with the young people I have worked with over the years. The difference for me was having a strong loving family and a good education.

Going up the management ladder in social services there were some good role models who encouraged me. There were also those moments when I realised that I could do jobs as well if not better than my colleagues (mainly male!) who were going for the promotions.

 What was the situation like at T2A when you joined? I.e. what was going on politically and policy wise and in the VCS criminal justice sector?

It is a trip down memory lane to look back at my early Alliance meeting notes. Take December 2012 – Chris Grayling was promoting ‘swift and sure justice’, the government said all community orders had to include a ‘punitive element’ and austerity was starting to bite. On a more positive note, Sadiq Khan then shadow justice minister spoke at the YJB convention saying he wanted to look at the merits and cost of the youth offending services having an 18+ remit. The ‘what if’ approach to history!

At T2A we launched the T2A Pathway which has acted as the backbone of the work and I think is still worth using as a reference point.

For the VCS austerity hadn’t quite hit. The Big Society ideology saved them for a while but as cuts hit local authorities the knock on to voluntary organisations really started to bite. Social Impact Bonds were all the rage.

It was wonderful to be working with an organisation such at BCT that committed their investments for the long term and believed so strongly in the voluntary sector. That really gave meaning and succour to the Alliance, I think.

What do you feel has been the greatest achievement of T2A in your time as chair?

Can chairs ever claim achievements? I like to think that in the early days the many discussions/debates with Max Rutherford, (the former CJ Programme Manager at BCT), helped with the thinking that went into the T2A programme. I like to think I fronted some of the public facing events well – party conference sessions, conference chairing, speaking to the Select Committee, meetings with ministers and officials. And of course chairing the Alliance meetings – making people feel welcome, asking reasonable questions when needed, thanking guests, trying to politely curtail some lengthy interventions, reading the moods of the meeting and finishing on time. I’m only sad that face to face meetings didn’t return on my watch. But who knows they might never!

 What do you think the future holds for the treatment of young adults in the CJS?

A Conservative MP told me recently not to be too pessimistic about the way things are going. A bit difficult given recent legislation, the massive cuts and yet more structural change as well as an underlying lack of care for the young adults we work with especially those from diverse backgrounds whose treatment by the CJS is shaming.

I think the MP said what he did knowing that ‘things change’ especially in politics, so one can only hope. And despite the politics there are many good things happening – the T2A message has never been stronger and heard by so many people. To make lasting and embedded change we need to make it conceivable that young adults in the CJS and all policy areas are seen as a distinct group with specific requirements. And that doing so makes economic as well as moral sense.

Finally, what do you think you’ll miss most about being chair of T2A?

Being a part of something so right – T2A is a coherent set of policy thinking and policy ambition, backed by research and evidence backed practice.

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Through the Howard League’s legal and participation work, it has identified that the sentencing of young adults is a pivotal stage that is little understood but has life-changing consequences.

As part of its work with T2A the Howard League is exploring this area in depth and has produced a number of publications and short films to embed the growing consensus that young adults require a distinct approach within the CJS.

The films provide practitioners, lawyers and sentencers with authoritative information on the distinct needs and characteristics of young adults in the criminal justice system. Watch the short films.

A new T2A (Transition to Adulthood) briefing on young adults and remand launched today makes the case for a reform of remand arrangements for the young adults.   

A substantial and growing evidence base has found that young adults aged 18-25 are a distinct group, because they are still maturing. Interrupting a young adult’s development with a period in custody should only be made as a last resort.  

The T2A report comes hot on the heels of the Chief Inspectorate of Prison’s short thematic review ‘Outcomes for Young Adults in Custody’, which was highly critical of the Government placing young adults in adult prisons without any coherent strategy, despite a decade of research and evidence explaining the uniqueness of the needs of young adults.  

Specific data is not available about the extent to which young adults remanded to custody subsequently receive a custodial sentence but in the case of children under 18 and women of all ages, most do not.  

Although there has been a decline in the numbers of young adults remanded in custody, the report argues there is scope for reducing them yet further. 

Recent research by Ed Cape and Tom Smith found that “nearly half of those people who are kept in custody at some stage before their trial or sentence were either found not guilty, or if found guilty, were given a non-custodial sentence”.  

In the context of a growing court backlog and highly restricted regimes in prisons because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the report’s author, Rob Allen, argues “it is particularly timely to consider the case for reform of remand arrangements”. ‘Extended Custody Time Limits’ introduced in September 2020 to manage court delays, threaten to leave thousands of people on remand in custody for longer than usual.  Young adults are spending longer in custody as a result of these court backlogs which were already problematic prior to the pandemic.   

The recognition of the need for a distinct approach to young adults has already led to a number of important criminal justice reforms such as expanded explanations in Sentencing Guidelines about how age and immaturity can affect both a young adult’s responsibility for an offence and how a particular sentence may impact on them. However, there has been no corresponding reform for young adults on custodial remand who, the report says: “can be deprived of their liberty for many months, often experiencing very impoverished regimes and … placed at risk of violence and self-harm”. 

 The briefing examines to what extent the specific developmental needs of young adults are taken into account by courts when making decisions about whether to remand defendants into custody. It also looks at the existing legal provisions which could be applied at the remand stage of criminal proceedings, and whether criminal justice agencies and courts think about the maturity of young adult defendants when making decisions about remanding them. 

If young adults aren’t remanded in custody the report looks at what alternatives are available, particularly young women, and defendants with mental health problems. 

Finally it looks at what measures might be taken to improve the distinctiveness of remand arrangements for 18-25 year olds?  Read ‘Young Adults on Remand’. 

T2A (Transition to Adulthood) welcomes the publication of this  important short thematic report on Outcomes for Young Adults in Custody which makes it clear that there is a lack of a clear strategy for young adults in custody, resulting in lost opportunities and poor outcomes. Although some individuals working in the prison system are highly motivated, their efforts are hampered by the lack of a systematic approach, integrated strategy and limited resources for this age group. 

The Chief Inspector’s report endorses many of the key findings and recommendations of a decade of T2A research and other independent reviews of how this age group are dealt with in prisons. We have long-advocated for distinct prison estate accommodation for this age group — separate from the over 25s — including well-tailored, developmentally-appropriate regimes that addresses the distinct needs – and opportunities for change – presented by young adults.  Outcomes for young adults have been poor for a considerable time and will be exacerbated by the current pandemic. T2A has been particularly concerned about outcomes for people of colour, people identifying as gypsy, traveller and Roma, and care experienced young people in and following custody. A more effective approach would understand the experiences of these people as well as young adults more generally and build on the numerous examples of effective practice undertaken in other jurisdictions in the UK and internationally. 

The Government can do more to stop these young people from becoming lifelong criminals who undermine our public safety. It is imperative that this evidence and the volume of credible voices calling for change are reflected in the Sentencing Bill when it comes before Parliament, otherwise an ‘open goal’ opportunity to reduce reoffending and be smarter about how we treat this group will be missed. 

Joyce Moseley, Chair of T2A said: “It is frustrating that despite practitioner, academic, government and Inspectorate findings, we have seen so little progress for young adults at a time when the  criminal justice system so needs an evidence-based strategy to mitigate the impact of the pandemic.  If the Government fails to act on yet one more damning report it will be another indictment of its failure to respond to the needs of a lost generation of young people, locking them into a cycle of crime and undermining public safety. 

A new report by the Youth Justice Legal Centre (YJLC), part of Just for Kids Law, reveals that severe delays in the criminal justice system are leaving children, families and victims in limbo, resulting in serious consequences for those who turn 18.

System delay is the main explanation for why children turn 18 years old between the commission of an offence and prosecution.  COVID-19 has exacerbated delays throughout the criminal justice system which is having a significant impact on children approaching their 18th birthday.

The most recent official data shows that 1,400 offences a year are committed by children who turn 18 prior to conviction but it is believed this is a significant underestimate and the number is expected to rise. Turning 18 prior to prosecution means the young people have their cases heard in adult courts and lose the opportunity to benefit from the youth justice system. This often happens because it can take months or sometimes years for the police or the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to make a charging decision. There are currently no fast-track options for children, including those approaching their 18th birthday.

The outcomes for children who turn 18  are vastly different to those of their peers who are prosecuted as children. The damaging consequences include losing access to youth diversion schemes, losing anonymity during court proceedings, only being eligible for adult sentences including much longer rehabilitation periods which reduce employment prospects and prevent people from moving on with their lives.

Just for Kids Law is calling for timely justice for those who commit offences as children. The report, Timely Justice: Turning 18, recommends that where this is not possible the same sentencing framework should be applied to all those who offend in childhood. It also recommends  a time limit of three months during which a child can be subject to release under investigation. And the report identifies an urgent need to collect and regularly publish accurate data on children who are released under investigation and those who commit offences but turn 18 prior to conviction.

The Youth Justice Legal Centre has also developed a legal guide to help lawyers navigate the different rules, regimes and principles which apply to those turning 18 in the criminal justice system.

Enver Solomon, Chief Executive at Just for Kids Law,  said:
‘It is a travesty of justice  that due to unnecessary delays in the criminal justice system young people who have offended in childhood are not able to benefit from legal protections which exist for those who break the law as children. As a result of the pandemic and court closures the situation is much worse with yet more delays and even more children being convicted as adults. Timely justice is crucial for children, families and victims. Young adults who committed offences as children must be given the opportunity to build meaningful futures and be treated fairly.’

New data obtained by Revolving Doors Agency under the Freedom of Information legislation reveals that:

• Over half of all reoffences committed by young adults are theft and summary non-motoring offences.
• Young adults whose index offences are theft and summary non-motoring offences also have the highest rates of reoffending in the same category as their index offence.
• Theft creates the highest level of churn of repeat offences in the same category, with a ratio of 994 reoffences per 1,000 reoffenders.
• This rate is strikingly above any other crime category. It is 12 times higher than repeated possession of a weapon (for example carrying knives) and 6 times higher than repeated violence against a person.

These new figures expose the difference in demand created by young adults committing more serious and sometimes violent crime and the group often called ‘the revolving door’ who commit persistent low-level offences driven by a combination of needs stemming from complex trauma and poverty. These repeated, non-violent offences drive demand for our police, courts and justice system but are driven by underlying, unaddressed need.

The volume and churn of young adults who are sucked into the criminal justice system for relatively minor offences highlights the need for a radical new approach. The current failing approach resulted in the proportion of people with a history of repeat offending reaching at its highest ever level, accounting for nearly two fifths of all offenders.

This stark evidence comes at the same time as Revolving Doors publish an evidence briefing “New Generation” highlighting the critical role of Police and Crime Commissioners and police services in preventing the new generation of young adults entering the revolving door. The report brings together new perspectives on characteristics and needs of young adults entering the revolving door.

Revolving Doors Agency has also announced that they are offering bespoke consultancy and intensive on the ground support for five areas to kick-start local initiatives. These sites will benefit from their research, lived experience, policy, and service design expertise. Their support, which will be free of charge, can help Police and Crime Commissioners and their offices implement new strategies to support better options for young adults, such as deferred prosecutions or diversion schemes to keep young adults out of the criminal justice system.

Nacro has published Using an identity lens: Constructive working with children in the criminal justice system.

Research has shown that identity, and how you feel about yourself, can be key to moving forward with life and away from crime. Working with the University of Salford, Youth Offending Teams and supported by the Barrow Cadbury Trust, this toolkit has been developed to promote a constructive, identity-focused approach to ultimately help divert children away from progressing further through the criminal justice system. Using the principles of the Nacro-led Beyond Youth Custody programme, this toolkit outlines how these can be applied to working with children before custody to support them towards positive outcomes and prevent further offending.  It includes sections on:

Understanding the importance of identity

Helping children develop their pro-social identity

Tools to help you work constructively

Whilst this toolkit has been aimed primarily at practitioners working with children in Youth Offending Teams, it could be applied when working with young adults and young people in different settings. The aim is to provide an approach which can be embedded over time and shape current practices, encouraging practitioners to think about how they can use an identity lens to better promote positive outcomes which, in turn, prevents offending.

For more information about this toolkit contact: [email protected].

Formal sentencing principles for young adults aged 18 to 25, similar to the Sentencing Council guidelines that are in place for children, would assist the courts and improve sentencing outcomes, a new report recommends.

Sentencing Young Adults: Making the case for sentencing principles for young adults presents research by the Howard League for Penal Reform, a founding member of the Transition to Adulthood (T2A) Alliance.

The report, which draws on Howard League participation work with young adults, sets out how principled guidelines would help judges and magistrates to understand young adults better, and provide a legal framework to achieve better sentencing decisions.  It recommends that the principles should consider the relationship between immaturity and blameworthiness, capacity to change, and the impact of race and histories of care.

It considers how the welfare principle – the principle that, when a court is dealing with proceedings relating to a child, its primary consideration shall lie with the welfare of the child – might be extended to apply to young adults, in recognition that full maturity and all the attributes of adulthood are not magically conferred on young people on their eighteenth birthdays.

The Howard League has brought together an advisory group of experts to help draft sentencing principles for young adults, drawing on the charity’s legal and participation work and the growing knowledge base about the needs and characteristics of young people.

More than 140,000 young adults aged 18 to 24 were sentenced in criminal courts last year.

Imprisonment of young adults can have tragic consequences. Between 2006 and 2016, 164 young adults aged 18 to 24 died in custody, 136 of whom lost their lives through suicide.

T2A welcomes the findings and recommendations of the Lammy Review published today.

Whilst the number of young adults in the prison population has decreased, the proportion of BAME young adults has risen.  T2A is very concerned by this growing disproportionality of BAME young adults in the criminal justice system and in particular the prison population. It is also vital that the ‘double disadvantage’ faced by BAME women in the CJS is recognised and addressed. The government’s response to this Review will be crucial in addressing these longstanding disparities.

The Review is right to identify the specific needs of young adults, and its recommendations for policy and practice reform would go some of the way towards T2A’s aim of promoting and disseminating the evidence for a distinct approach to the 18-25 young adult population involved in the CJS.

In particular, T2A supports the proposal that every young adults’ maturity should be taken into account in criminal justice decision-making. This reflects evidence from neuroscience that shows young adults’ brains are not fully developed until the mid-20s.

T2A also welcomes the recommendation that professionals have the option of “extending the support structures of the youth justice system for offenders over the age of 18 who are judged to have low levels of maturity”. This is a common-sense approach that has been tried and tested in most European countries, where youth justice routinely extends beyond 18, and in some cases well into the late 20s.

T2A and its partners await the official response to the Review with interest, and will seek to support its implementation

Sheffield Hallam’s first interim evaluation report into the Transition to Adulthood Pathway Programme, in partnership with Social Justice Solutions (SJS), has been published today.

The University and SJS were commissioned by Barrow Cadbury Trust to evaluate the T2A Pathway programme demonstration projects which were set up to test approaches which take account of maturity and transitions for young adults at key points on the T2A Pathway.

The six projects are run by voluntary organisations which provide targeted initiatives to support young people and address the underlying causes of crime.  The organisations are Addaction, Advance, PACT, The Prince’s Trust, Remedi, and Together for Mental Wellbeing.

This evaluation report drew on the lessons learned from the T2A pilot projects (2009-2013) and will provide an evidence base for the T2A approach with examples of best practice and case studies.  It also outlines what could be done differently at each stage of the criminal justice process – from policing and arrest to custody and resettlement – and provides robust evidence and recommendations for commissioners, practitioners and policy-makers.

This is the first interim report for the evaluation.  A further interim report, final formative evaluation report and final summative evaluation report are due to be produced later this year and in 2017.  The report presents research findings focused on the development, set up and early implementation of the T2A Pathway projects, examining the effectiveness of the processes and partnership arrangements used to deliver the approach within each project site.

Panda Media have also been filming the projects to capture the effectiveness of the projects, to demonstrate how T2A principles are embodied in a ‘real life’ environment and to give a voice to some of the young adults and staff involved.  You can see the videos here.

While the six projects operated at different points on the T2A Pathway their delivery models had common features such as: a welfare-driven approach to young adults; a befriending relationship between project staff and clients; and a holistic approach to the complex and numerous needs of clients.

Some projects benefited from their past experience of delivering similar services, and others from existing working relationships with key statutory partners, such as police, probation and YOTS.  Some projects were able to align their service to meet a locally-identified unmet need that had been identified by key statutory agencies.

Whilst a proportion of the projects appeared to be on track to achieve the target numbers of clients that had been originally identified in applications, challenges remained for others in securing referrals to meet their targets; in some instances this was due to a mismatch between available resources and the scope of the delivery model, which may have been too ambitious.

The interim report found that deploying staff with the right attitude and skills to work with the client group combined with effective staff induction and appropriate training made a big difference to the capacity of a project to operate effectively.

Partnership working operated at different levels across the projects. Projects with the involvement of senior managers from statutory agencies and those with project staff visibly working in partner agency environments saw benefits. However, the report found that cultural dissonance between VCS and statutory agency staff was evident in some projects.

Many of the factors which can improve a project and many of the barriers to the successful development, set-up and operation of projects are not new and are common to these types of initiatives.  A body of evidence already exists to provide learning about these issues.

Project beneficiaries, project staff and partner  agencies were able to identify common benefits such as enhancing self-esteem, encouraging a more positive outlook on their lives, and learning life skills. Benefits for the VCS lead organisation included: an appreciation of the benefits of delivering a preventative initiative; better working relationships with statutory agencies; and expanding their network of agencies. Project and partner agency staff also became more aware of the importance of staff understanding the needs of young adults and females specifically and how that understanding could reduce demand on services as well as reducing workloads.

Read the report

Watch the videos