Young people’s care careers: profile from SCRA data

Data from SCRA in respect of 98 young people subject to a HSR in Thistle City at 31st of December 2008 provided a profile of  this group of young people. Table 2 shows the age and gender distribution for this group of young people.

 

 Referral Patterns

  •  In average, young people’s first referral to the Reporter took place just before their 9th birthday.
  • First referrals were in most cases (44%) due to lack of parental care. This is for both boys and girls independent of their age at the time of first recorded referral.
  • Most recent referrals (as of 31/01/09) were due to ‘allegedly committed an offence’ (41.8%); ‘lack of parental care’ (26%) and ‘victim of a schedule 1 offence’ (12%).
  • At the 31st of January 2009 most young people (62%) had accrued one or ore referrals on offence grounds. Referrals on offence grounds peeked between the ages of 10 and 13 years old. More boys (n=46) that girls (n=15) were referred on offence grounds (although this was not statistically significant).
  • There was a small number of persistent young offenders who had accrued five or more referrals on grounds of offence within a six month period.

Supervision Requirements (SR)

  • The first recorded SR for most (88%) young people was at home with parent or relevant person. The second most common type of first recorded SR was with relative/friend (5%).
  • At the 31st of January 2009 95 of the 98 young people were subject to a HSR.
  • When taking into consideration all episodes of SR since the end of 2001 young people were spending, in average, four and a half years subject to any one time of compulsory measures. This is likely to be an underestimation as the data obtained from SCRA only goes as far back as the end of 2001.
  • Just over a quarter of young people – 10 girls and 18 boys – had also experienced periods being looked after away from home. Young people were, on average, spending just under a year (360 days) away from home.
  • Seven (six boys and one girl) out of these 28 young people had experienced more than one type of placement while looked after away from home.