Preventative Services
The aim of pre-crime prevention is to identify children and
young people who are at high risk of offending and help them to
avoid entering the Youth Justice System. The Youth Justice Board has
developed a variety of programmes which are intended to achieve
this aim.
Youth Inclusion Programme (YIP)
Junior Youth Inclusion Programme
Youth Inclusion Programmes (YIPs), established in 2000, are
tailor made programmes for 13 to 16-year-olds who are engaged in
crime or are identified as being most at risk of offending,
truancy, or social exclusion. Junior YIPs are for 8-13 year
olds. YIPs target young people in a neighbourhood who are
considered to be most at risk of offending, but are also open to
other young people in the local area. The programme operates in 72
of the most deprived/high crime estates in England and Wales.
YIPs aim to reduce youth crime in neighbourhoods. Young people
on the YIP are identified through a number of different agencies
who work together. These include the Youth Offending Team (YOT),
police, social services, local education authorities or schools,
other local agencies and the community. The programme gives young
people somewhere safe to go where they can learn new skills, take
part in activities with others and get help with their education
and careers guidance. Positive role models – the workers and
volunteer mentors – help to change young people's attitudes to
education and crime.
Each project has the following targets:
- to ensure that at least 75% of the target group (the 50 most at
risk young people) are engaged, and that those engaged receive at
least five hours of appropriate interventions per week
- to reduce arrest rates among the target group by 70% compared
to the 12 months prior to their engagement
- to ensure that 90% of those in the engaged target group are in
suitable full-time education or employment
Youth Inclusion and Support Panels (YISPs)
Youth Inclusion and Support Panels (YISPs) aim to prevent
antisocial behaviour and offending by 8 to 13-year-olds who are
considered to be at high risk of offending.
They have been designed to help the YJB meet its target of
putting in place, in each YOT in England and Wales, programmes that
will identify and reduce the likelihood of young people committing
offences.
Panels are made up of a number of representatives of different
agencies (e.g. police, schools, health and social services). The
main emphasis of a panel's work is to ensure that children and
their families, at the earliest possible opportunity, can access
mainstream public services
In Cheshire East the YISPs provided by Crime Concern is in
Crewe.
