HMI Probation: How Youth Justice Services can meet the new victims’ standard
This is a blog by our Communications and Campaigns Manager, Keeva Baxter.
Why me? recently held a forum for the youth justice sector, on the topic of meeting the new Victims’ Standard, as set by HM Inspectorate for Probation. The forum was well attended, with over 90 people coming to learn more about the standard and how services can ensure they score well. We were joined by Helen Mercer, Head of Standards and Policy at HMI Probation, who gave a presentation on the new standard and how to meet it. This was followed by a Q&A session in which attendees could ask Helen about key elements of the standard or share the challenges they were facing.
What is the new standard?
The new standard states that work should be ‘high-quality, individualised, and responsive driving positive outcomes and safety for victims’. As part of this, there are two key questions:
V1.1 Is work with victims high-quality, individualised, and responsive?
V1.2 Do organisational arrangements and activity drive quality, individualised, and responsive service for victims.
Key messages from the Inspectorate
The Inspectorate recognise that most youth justice services have small teams or single people in the victim worker post.
Helen stated, in reference to V1.1 that “we are not looking for perfection, instead we are looking for the work to be sufficient”.
For more information and if you have any questions, Helen said that the following three documents are crucial:
Youth Justice Inspection Manual – Explains what to expect from the inspection process
Youth Justice Rules and Guidance – How they make decisions about organisational arrangements and activities
Case assessment rules and guidelines (from page 57) – How they make judgements about casework with victims
What are other people doing to meet the new standard?
We asked the attendees to discuss in small groups what they are doing to meet the new standard, and used Padlet to collect their responses. People shared a variety of ideas, from whole year-long journeys to new policies or tools they’ve implemented.
You can see people’s responses here
Key questions on the standard
At the end of the session, we ran a Q&A session with Helen Mercer – these are her responses.
Q: Will there be a Welsh speaking inspector available for YJS’ based in Wales?
A: Yes, there will be.
Q: If the YJS facilitates community resolutions, including those issued by the police outside of any assessment process, would HMIP inspect those cases against the victim standard?
A: We use a common inspection framework to inspect all cases of victims eligible to receive services from the YJS. This includes any victim who has consented for their information to be shared between police and the YJS, irrespective of the type of offence, the nature or age of the victim, or the type of service provided to the victim. full details are in our Inspection Manual Youth-justice-inspection-manual.pdf (what to expect from the inspection process)
Q: How will you assess if the victim has made an informed choice?
A: the case assessment rules and guidance explain in more detail how we judge this: When engaging with victims, the YJS must clearly explain its role and allow victims to make informed choices about whether they wish to be involved with the YJS, what this might involve and whether they want to access the services available. This should include a detailed explanation of the offer of support, the role of YJS in safety planning and keeping the victim safe, referral to other services, restorative activities, and reparation opportunities (as appropriate). This may include giving the victim appropriate leaflets and explanation of appropriate onward referrals. The full case assessment rules and guidance (how we make our judgements about casework with victims) is here starting at page 57 (the first 56 pages are about work with children not victims) Youth-justice-CARaG.pdf. And how we make judgements about the organisational arrangements and activity (Question v1.2 is contained here: Youth-justice-rules-and-guidance.pdf
Q: What type of training would you recommend all victim workers have?
A: The rules and guidance sets this out: Staff working with victims should receive distinct and specialist training for the role, including trauma-informed approaches, equity, diversity and inclusion, assessment of needs, delivering interventions, the dynamics of victims’ experiences of harm and abuse, age appropriate language for talking about harm, methods of communication and engagement, approaches to risk assessment, and safety planning.
Q: Have these inspections started or will this be implemented next year?
A: Yes they have, the first one was in February.
Q: Do we know when to expect the first inspection report of new YJS framework?
A: Don’t have an exact date, but it is imminent.
Q: How much weight is given to victim feedback? Practitioners have been struggling with this for a long time, it’s very difficult to get them to provide written feedback.
A: It is not a dealbreaker, if as a service you’ve done everything you can to get feedback but it isn’t forthcoming, that is fine. We have to be realistic and not penalise people for that.
Q: What sort of weight do you carry when it comes to these inspections, will the YJB take it seriously?
A: It is not a new expectation, but take on board that it hasn’t always happened previously. It holds weight, this standard is 25% of an overall YJ inspection rating.
Q: Which cases are in scope for the inspection of the victims’ standard?
A: The answers are in more detail in the Youth justice manual on our website here is the link Youth Justice Inspection Guidance Manual – HM Inspectorate of Probation and it is in section 42. I have pulled out the key information below:
We use a common inspection framework to inspect all cases of victims eligible to receive services from the YJS. This includes any victim who has consented for their information to be shared between police and the YJS, irrespective of the type of offence, the nature or age of the victim, or the type of service provided to the victim.
Victim case sample selection The YJS is asked to provide a longlist of all victims within a specific timeframe, where the YJS has received contact details from the police. This includes victims living outside the area covered by the YJS. We do not inspect victim cases where no contact details have been 27 received from the police. The ISA selects a number of victim cases randomly from the longlist. More detail about specific arrangements is provided in the case sample specification, sent to a YJS when we announce an inspection. This is discussed in detail at the planning meeting.
If you have specific questions for Helen, or if you would be interested in attending a further forum on this topic, let us know!
