15 yr old jailed, "unmanageable in the community"

[likesfish]

The problem is yes he has issues and needs help.
But people also need to be protected form an anti social toerag whose being a pain in the arse.

Maybe he might get a clue now that actions have consquences though I doubt it

 

[purves grundy]

Knowing the area from which he comes, I doubt he has been managed. But given his reaction to the arrest, and in court, he seems to need proper care, I don't see how jailing him will help him.

Me too on both counts. Looking at the openness of the area and the houses peeking out above the vans, looks like Wybers or East Marsh to me.

Fucking sad story

 

[weepiper]

I can't help but think of the two cousins in the case I did jury service for last year. One 25, one 18. They'd turned over a bookies with a knife for a little over a grand. We found them guilty and the older one got five years, the younger one three. There was a history of alcoholism in the family and they were clearly of a poor background and finding them guilty left a bad taste in my mouth because it just wasn't fair, seeing two basically daft wee laddies trying pathetically to defend themselves against university-educated advocates and a guy in a wig who lives a comfortable life a million miles from their own. However when it comes down to it they had threatened a shopworker with a knife. Later on after sentencing when the newspaper reports came out it turned out they'd both been in and out of YOIs since they were fourteen for originally minor offences that were just escalating. I don't know, it just seems a lot of people must have been able to see this happening in slow motion for years but nothing had been successfully done about it

 

[equationgirl]

He's been written off, as a society we have clearly failed him and countless others

 

[purves grundy]

In a utopia of course there would be the resources to put all troubled kids in to a secure unit where they can receive decent pastoral care and a full medical evaluation. But as that's not happening any time soon

Any solution worth its salt is gonna be much more expensive for the next few rounds of budget development and implementation than policing him, involving all manner of social services and special educational facilities. Twenty years down the line when he may have fucked god knows how many people over and demanded surveillance and more policing the cost will probably be way more massive.

 

[equationgirl]

I"m not defending what he did, just that he's on a predictable path that he could have been diverted off had society cared enough to put proper resources in place to help.

 

[weltweit]

It is a difficult case to comment on as I have the impression we don't know anywhere near the full story.

But missing his GCSEs will in part doom him where employment is concerned, as will a prison record so his future is not looking rosy.

 

[bi0boy]

Can he not do his GCSEs inside?

 

[SpookyFrank]

There's a couple of kids I work with who I can imagine going a similar way a few years from now. It doesn't come from nowhere, you can see the effects of neglect and cruelty. What you never see is a kid who has chosen to be a menace to society, just a kid whose mental wiring has been fucked around so much that reacting to things in a rational way is simply not an option.

 

[weltweit]

There's a couple of kids I work with who I can imagine going a similar way a few years from now. It doesn't come from nowhere, you can see the effects of neglect and cruelty. What you never see is a kid who has chosen to be a menace to society, just a kid whose mental wiring has been fucked around so much that reacting to things in a rational way is simply not an option.

Are you alluding in part to family?

 

[8ball]

Can he not do his GCSEs inside?

In any case, missing some exams seems like the least of his problems.

It's very sad, but I doubt there are many people in 'the authorities' who are well-placed to help him with his ways of dealing with authority.

 

[not-bono-ever]

so sad reading the transcript of the trial- yes hes probabaly off his face and a menance to society and all that shit, but hes just a kid after all- still wanting his dad to protect him

 

[SpookyFrank]

Are you alluding in part to family?

Yes. Child protection issues are beyond my pay grade (in fact everything is because I'm a volunteer) but we do have people who are equipped to communicate with families, and to pass things on to social services etc if necessary.

Family social work must be one of the most harrowing jobs going. There's no easy answers to any of this stuff and it seems like the kind of intensive, broad-spectrum support so many families need simply doesn't exist. Every penny you invest in the welfare of children you'll probably save tenfold in the long run, but that's the sort of timescale that politicians aren't interested in. Better to pinch a few more pennies today and let some future government worry about the consequences.

 

[comrade spurski]

There used to be secure children's home for teens like this. They were not jails but the teens could not go and leave as they pleased. They had to earn certain things like trips out but had a right to other things like a set amount of tv time, access to a radio etc. The staff were all social services based and they ran therapeutic sessions to try and undo whatever damage had been done to the teen. There was a very high staff to child ratio. Work was also done with the family (wherever possible). There were also regular childrens homes for those that were waiting for fostering placements and parents who were alcoholics or drug dependent or who were simply in need of some help could ask social services for a break and their children would be cared for in these homes. Again the ratio of staff to children was high.
In 1989 the 'childrens act' was introduced and these homes were 'phased out' not closed you understand...and it was agreed (by the tory government) that the family was the only place for children.
They saved millions on the social services bill and all of us who said they were going to create a massive long term social problem were shout down as liberal do gooders.
There was a lot wrong with social services back in the day but there was also a lot of good work done but to take money from the poor and redistribute it via tax cuts to the rich the tories fucked it all up.
The youth clubs, playcentre and adventure playgrounds were all free and provided children with a safe place to play where there were rules ... the parks all had park keepers who provided a level of order to keep children safe.
Children didn't need to hang round in gangs defending their 2 street territory with clubs and knives cos they had some where to go that was a bit naff but safe.

In order to save some more money the tories fuckers shut these services down or charged for them making them unrecognisable and pretty useless.
I do not pretend that there were no troubled kids as a result but there were a fuck load less imo.

 

[campanula]

My daughter and I both did our social work masters at UEA but with a gap of some 20odd years. We had been despairing at the immense differences, not just with practical issues such as budget and staffing constraints but on a more profound level, with the actual attitudes and aspirations both within the establishment and reflected in the behaviour and expectations of potential social workers. Most strikingly is the huge shift from prevention to punitive measures, which also emerges in the often quite repressive ideals of young social workers (who fail to have even the smallest grasp of class politics, for example. Whilst I finally caved after 25 years (to be a gardener) my poor daughter is deeply demoralised at being what she feels is little more than an agent of state oppression. As a consequence, despite being a poor single parent, she recently took a paydrop of 10K in order to work for children's services with refugee families...a move which has left her reliant on tax credits and housing benefit but also optimistic and energised. The problems in social care run from top to bottom and I honestly see no future for state intervention (although the recent move into outsourcing children's services has also been depressing).

Interestingly, the last few years of my career was spent working with young offenders during the period of changes within the probation service and the changing remits of NACRO and the role of social services. In effect, what had been a partnership between agencies was already fragmenting into private sector housing and rehab provision which was largely unaccountable and very patchy.

 

[8den]

Its one of this situations where you think "what we really need here is a team of brilliantly trained well funded social workers and a time machine"​

 

[ViolentPanda]

I can't help but think of the two cousins in the case I did jury service for last year. One 25, one 18. They'd turned over a bookies with a knife for a little over a grand. We found them guilty and the older one got five years, the younger one three. There was a history of alcoholism in the family and they were clearly of a poor background and finding them guilty left a bad taste in my mouth because it just wasn't fair, seeing two basically daft wee laddies trying pathetically to defend themselves against university-educated advocates and a guy in a wig who lives a comfortable life a million miles from their own. However when it comes down to it they had threatened a shopworker with a knife. Later on after sentencing when the newspaper reports came out it turned out they'd both been in and out of YOIs since they were fourteen for originally minor offences that were just escalating. I don't know, it just seems a lot of people must have been able to see this happening in slow motion for years but nothing had been successfully done about it

That's pretty much the story of many petty offenders given youth custodial, with a minority of exceptions. There's no money, and even less political will, to rehabilitate, only to punish, regardless of the fact that it fucks someone's life. We're expected to give corrupt politicians and bankers second chances, but those who actually deserve them are left to go hang.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Can he not do his GCSEs inside?

Highly unlikely given the parlous state of education in YOIs and in adult prisons. They're barely able to meet demand for basic literacy classes.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Its one of this situations where you think "what we really need here is a team of brilliantly trained well funded social workers and a time machine"​

A properly resourced youth criminal justice system would also be helpful.

 

[existentialist]

There's a couple of kids I work with who I can imagine going a similar way a few years from now. It doesn't come from nowhere, you can see the effects of neglect and cruelty. What you never see is a kid who has chosen to be a menace to society, just a kid whose mental wiring has been fucked around so much that reacting to things in a rational way is simply not an option.

Yes, me, too. And I am alluding entirely to family.

 

[Casually Red]

Hmm just read through it and read a bit between the lines, it sounds as though attempts were made to "manage" him and they failed. Couldn't jail also be seen as a form of management? Maybe it could be a chance to put him on the spot and work with him intensively without him having chance to be "distracted". I would hope there is some sort of psychiatric evaluation/treatment accompanying the sentence. Jail isn't ideal but isolating him from his usual surroundings may focus his mind a bit along with protecting the community from his actions.

Maybe his long suffering community could do with some respite for a while .

 

[Fuchs66]

Maybe his long suffering community could do with some respite for a while .

Maybe!

But that's difficult to say for sure from the report.

 

[ViolentPanda]

My daughter and I both did our social work masters at UEA but with a gap of some 20odd years. We had been despairing at the immense differences, not just with practical issues such as budget and staffing constraints but on a more profound level, with the actual attitudes and aspirations both within the establishment and reflected in the behaviour and expectations of potential social workers. Most strikingly is the huge shift from prevention to punitive measures, which also emerges in the often quite repressive ideals of young social workers (who fail to have even the smallest grasp of class politics, for example. Whilst I finally caved after 25 years (to be a gardener) my poor daughter is deeply demoralised at being what she feels is little more than an agent of state oppression. As a consequence, despite being a poor single parent, she recently took a paydrop of 10K in order to work for children's services with refugee families...a move which has left her reliant on tax credits and housing benefit but also optimistic and energised. The problems in social care run from top to bottom and I honestly see no future for state intervention (although the recent move into outsourcing children's services has also been depressing).

Interestingly, the last few years of my career was spent working with young offenders during the period of changes within the probation service and the changing remits of NACRO and the role of social services. In effect, what had been a partnership between agencies was already fragmenting into private sector housing and rehab provision which was largely unaccountable and very patchy.

IMO the biggest single disaster visited on social work as a profession was the switch from provision to commissioning. At a stroke it (conservatively) drew 10-15% out of social services budgets in administration costs, and as a consequence of "market principles" the remaining funds went less far because providers charged the maximum the commissioner could bear.
Another massively-damaging ongoing disaster is the degree of everyday political interference in social work - every time something goes wrong, ministers intervene with ill thought-out strategies to stop the same thing happening again, without realising that even with the best staff and the best funding, such tragedies will still occur, because while you can legislate to receive optimum performance from staff, staff are only human, and will err. Most of the time the error will be harmless, but occasionally it will be tragic. Less interference and diktat means that people have more time to focus on the core of their work - helping people.

 

[8den]

A properly resourced youth criminal justice system would also be helpful.

Yeah makes you think, "right the entire countries fucked up, lets burn the place to ground, and then when the insurance money comes in, we just start over from scratch and do it properly this time."

 

[8den]

Maybe his long suffering community could do with some respite for a while .

Yes some of the even handed community justice teams from your neck of the woods would have sorted the situation out much better. They've have even rolled up his jeans so when bullet entered the kneecap they wouldn't have infected the wound. Thoughtful like.

 

[Casually Red]

Idiot .

They make them take their jeans down . You'd be there all fucking night with those skinny jeans .

 

[likesfish]

The poor sod would probably be better off with the 1930s approach to troubled kids shove them in the military.
But even that shitty chance to change his life is denied now,militarys now too small and can afford to be picky

 

[ViolentPanda]

It's really one of those situations where you think, "right the entire countries fucked up, lets burn the place to ground, and then when the insurance money comes in, we just start over from scratch and do it properly this time."

Only if you burn the politicians to the ground too, though.

 

[8den]

Only if you burn the politicians to the ground too, though.

Well sure, we're going to need kindling.

 

[FiFi]

IMO the biggest single disaster visited on social work as a profession was the switch from provision to commissioning. At a stroke it (conservatively) drew 10-15% out of social services budgets in administration costs, and as a consequence of "market principles" the remaining funds went less far because providers charged the maximum the commissioner could bear.
Another massively-damaging ongoing disaster is the degree of everyday political interference in social work - every time something goes wrong, ministers intervene with ill thought-out strategies to stop the same thing happening again, without realising that even with the best staff and the best funding, such tragedies will still occur, because while you can legislate to receive optimum performance from staff, staff are only human, and will err. Most of the time the error will be harmless, but occasionally it will be tragic. Less interference and diktat means that people have more time to focus on the core of their work - helping people.

I can't like this - due to the situation being so bloody sad, not because I don't agree with you assessment.
You have summed up the problems in the whole publicsector, not just Social Care Departments.