30 October 2015

Ministry of Justice announces mandatory maturity assessments for all young adult offenders

News and events

In a significant development for the young adult agenda, the Ministry of Justice has announced that all young adults will receive mandatory maturity assessments as part of Pre-Sentence Reports (PSRs) to inform sentencing decisions. This has been a key T2A policy position for a number of years. 

In its submission to the Justice Select Committee Inquiry on Young Adult Offenders, the Ministry of Justice states that:

“We recognise the level of maturity in respect of young adults varies compared to older adults, as does their life experience…

Currently maturity assessments are not mandatory in a pre-sentence report (PSR), except where the young adult has drug or alcohol problems which are directly linked to the offence. PSR writers are trained in completing assessments including consideration of maturity. 

There is published guidance[15] for them to follow and Probation Instruction (PI 05/2011) is to be re-issued later this year and will make maturity assessments mandatory in respect of every young adult offender (aged 18-24).

The PI will also require PSR writers to liaise with the Youth Offender Service to ensure that information on previous supervision can be taken into account by the court.” (Extract from Sections 1 and 39, emphasis added)

Ministry of Justice’s reference above to published guidance on maturity assessments is in fact to T2A’s own ‘Taking Account of Maturity: A Practice Guide for Probation Practitioners’, developed by the University of Birmingham. This T2A guidance was made available at no charge to probation services since publication in 2013, and to date more than 13,000 copies have been disseminated.

T2A will look at the detail behind this announcement, and will seek to ensure that this positive development is implemented as effectively as possible.