Restorative justice part of response to anti-social behaviour in Blackpool

The summer saw a number of clashes with out of control youngsters which culminated in police imposing a dispersal zone in August covering large areas of North Shore and Layton.

It gave police powers to order people out of the area until midnight on Sunday August 23.

Councillors asked what further action was being taken to resolve the situation after being presented with an update report on improvement plans for the town’s youth offending team (YOT) which had been rated inadequate in October 2018.

Head of service Moya Foster told a meeting of the children and young people’s scrutiny committee the team was working with youngsters, their parents and residents to provide restorative justice and reassurance.

She said: “There is a three week operation around reassurance and visibility in the area that the police have put in place. So there is a lot of work going on.

“They are quite young children, some of them, and while I don’t condone their behaviour we need to do some huge work around community cohesion, and that’s something that should happen in the next couple of weeks.”

The committee heard action to improve the YOT included better use of out of court disposals so fewer children went through the court system “because issues are dealt with proportionately”.

Instead of going to court, measures taken to avoid criminalising children include use of restorative justice with social media helping youth workers to engage better with young people.

A new protocol for preventing the criminalisation of children in care has also been launched.

Dedicated police officers now “have regular contact with local children’s care homes to encourage them to consider alternative ways to deal with children who may commit low level criminal behaviour within the units”, a report to the committee says.

For those children who do end up in court, “strong bail proposals are being presented to the court as a direct alternative to custody”, while a review of pre-sentence reports has also been carried out.