The National Youth Agency - Justice and Safety

Justice and Safety

The NYA Youth justice and community safety team has been working with youth services and their partners to identify good practice in this area and factors critical to the success of this work.

Crime affects the lives of many young people, both as victims and perpetrators. However, youth work can make a significant contribution to creating safer, stronger and more sustainable communities by helping young people stay safe and make a positive contribution and develop long-lasting solutions to anti-social behaviour and crime.

It is important to involve young people in community safety and crime reduction; to recognise that some young people are not only part of the problem, but they need to be part of the solution. Anti-social behaviour strategies and action plans need to ensure that young people are on board in order to have a lasting effect.

About the NYA's Community Safety and Youth Justice work

Our staff work to influence both policy and practice by:

Providing specialist support to manageers, policy makers and practitioners
Working with youth services and their partners to identify good practice in the area of community safety, crime and disorder and youth justice and factors critical to the success of this work
Undertaking research and development activity on behalf of a range of organisations, some of which may invovel direct work with young people
Producing a range of information and publications to support practitioners and young people in developing and improving practice
Contributing to the development of youth work policy and dissemination
Representing The National Youth Agency's interests on the Standing Committee for Youth Justice and the ADCS Youth Crime Group.

Read the Services for youth justice and community safety agencies leaflet which details the services The NYA Youth justice and community safety team provide. these include:

Advice and Expertise
Consultancy and Training
Research, Monitoring and Evaluation
Publications
Events
How we work

Useful reading:

To follow is the full version of the article by Richard McHugh of Manchester’s Discus project as referred to on The National Youth Agency pages focusing on youth justice and community safety in the 8 to 14 October issue of Children and Young People Now magazine – How does the Reluctant Worker work with the Reluctant Gangster? Interpolate and Emancipate or Perpetuate?

Useful links

Standing Committee on Youth Justice: this coalition works to promote the welfare of children who become engaged in the youth justice system and advocates for a child-focussed youth justice system that promotes the integration of such children into society and thus serves the best interests of the children themselves and the community at large.
Web: http://www.scyj.org.uk/