Beyond Youth Custody guidelines in The Independent and LBC

Findings from Beyond Youth Custody (BYC), which brings together Nacro and three research and evaluation partners, were featured in an article in The Independent.

The piece reported on the guidelines put forward by the Sentencing Council, which encourage judges to avoid criminalisation of young people, especially those from ethnic minorities, by examining their background in greater detail.

It mentions the findings from BYC which revealed that many young offenders who end up in custody have had “complicated and chaotic lives”. As well as the findings that repeat offenders are statistically very likely to have experienced trauma, abuse, bereavement, grown up in care, been excluded from school, have experienced drug or alcohol dependencies and have mental health problems or personality disorders.

Nacro’s head of Policy and Public Affairs also echoed these points in an interview on the LBC drive time show.

What is Better Youth Custody?

Funded by The National Lottery Community Fund (previously Big Lottery Fund) as part of the Youth in Focus initiative, Beyond Youth Custody (BYC) was a six-year England-wide learning and awareness programme. BYC built a robust evidence base about what works in terms of effective resettlement for young people. This evidence base – rooted in the views of children and young people – was used to challenge, advance and promote better thinking in policy and practice for the effective resettlement of young people leaving in custody.

BYC was a partnership led by Nacro with three research and evaluation partners: ARCS (UK), the University of Salford, and the University of Bedfordshire.