Report published on criminal advice and remittals to the Children’s Hearing System

Date: 12th July 2017
Category: Child justice system

A new report from the Centre for Youth and Criminal Justice (CYCJ) has found that almost half of young people who have had requests for advice to Children's Hearings or remittals from courts to Children's Hearings had been exposed to violence in the family home.

The report also found that of this group of children and young people:

• Over a third have experienced significant bereavement
• A third had been separated from their main care giver
• Almost a quarter were recorded as having a disability yet 41% were not receiving support for this disability

Many of the children and young people also had previous involvement in the Hearings System (98%) and had histories of offending (87%).

The report was written by Dr Gillian Henderson, Information and Research Manager at the Scottish Children's Reporter Administration. The research was carried out to provide evidence to inform the implementation of the Youth Justice Strategy. It looks at the cases of all young people with advice requested from criminal courts and Children's Hearings held in 2015-16 and any remittals following this advice; and those cases remitted from courts in 2015-16 where there was no previous advice request.

• Read the full report here.