ADCS, the Association of YOT Managers and the Local Government Association have produced this joint policy position paper which articulates the challenges facing the youth justice system, including the overrepresentation of children with special educational needs, who are in care or are from Black and ethnic minority backgrounds in the system plus a crisis in some areas of custodial provision.

The paper puts forward a series of recommendations to existing policy or practice to better align the current system with Child First principles, including closer working between the police and YOTs and routinely applying rules on vulnerable witnesses to all children appearing in youth courts.

In the longer term, the paper proposes a more sophisticated, multi-agency response is needed to meeting the more complex needs of the cohort of children in conflict with the law, which is best achieved via a cross-Whitehall public health response to youth justice and wider childhood vulnerabilities.

• View position statement (pdf)