T2A Pilots

To build the evidence for the T2A campaign, the Barrow Cadbury Trust  established six projects, running from 2009, which are testing different approaches to improving services for young adults in the criminal justice system. Of these, three main T2A pilots have enabled demonstration of different community interventions, all tailored to the needs of the individual, with the aim of reducing both the risk of reoffending and social exclusion.

The three pilots are in Birmingham, West Mercia and London, and are delivered by Staffordshire and West Midlands Probation Trust, YSS and the St Giles Trust respectively. The pilots are subject to a formative evaluation by the University of Oxford’s Centre for Criminology, completed at the start of 2011, which identified promising early results and highlighted the pilots’ success in engaging young adults in actions which will help them towards better lives. An outcomes evaluation and a cost-benefit analysis will be completed by early 2012.

More detail about the three main T2A pilots, and a film about each, is found below.

London T2A, run by St Giles Trust, works across Southwark and Croydon with young adults in prison prior to their release, and during and after release into the community. It provides intensive support to divert young adults, principally young men, away from offending and enables them to build a new life for themselves. Support offered includes help with housing, accessing training and employment, as well as emotional support with issues such as relationships, behaviour, self esteem and self perception. The service is delivered by staff who are all ex-offenders, which helps to provide a level of trust and credibility with the young adults. The London T2A teams have been welcomed by the Youth Offending Teams and Croydon Probation Service. Croydon Probation makes direct referrals to the service, and the local Youth Offending Team has invited the T2A teams to work alongside their key workers on some cases. The T2A teams have also built up good relationships with the local police, who also refer young adults directly to the T2A teams.

West Mercia T2A is run by YSS and works with young adult offenders with high needs in the community. The project offers a flexible, community based, one-to-one support and mentoring service, using a mixture of paid staff and local volunteers. Each young adult on the T2A project determines what level of support they require, including support for family members. The key worker steers them through the available provision, overcoming any barriers (real or perceived) and provides feedback to agencies to influence service practice and policy development. Each young person develops their own action plan with smart objectives. Staff are responsive to need and flexible in their approach due to the potential changing and chaotic lifestyles of the young adults involved. YSS has established a robust multi-agency T2A steering group with senior management representation from across the criminal justice system, and the T2A project encourages regular discourse between the West Mercia Probation Trust and the Youth Offending Team, and key workers are regular visitors at team meetings and will often meet up to discuss T2A referrals. The project operates across the Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire and Telford local authority areas

Birmingham T2A is delivered by the Staffordshire and West Midlands Probation Trust and is aimed at young adults aged 17-24 years of age identified as posing a medium risk of reoffending. The project enables intervention to be tailored to the maturity and needs of the individual young adult and offers mentoring, as well as specific help with accommodation, employment, relationships and substance misuse, depending on their needs. It also aims to instil change in the young adults’ lives, to enhance their life opportunities, to influence their choices and to move them away from crime, reduce worklessness and improve emotional well-being. The project manages the transfer process of all young people moving across from the Youth Offending Service to adult Probation services, and works in the courts to ensure that sentencers are kept informed about community options and alternatives to custody, particularly following breach of an order.