TARGETING THE AFTER-SCHOOL CRIMINALS

The new police standards unit at the Home Office is to urge police to make
greater efforts to intervene against youth offenders who commit crimes
immediately after school ends, and in streets surrounding schools. The
move, designed to tackle the worst youth crime hot spots, follows research
from the Metropolitan Police showing a large proportion of youth crime is
committed in late afternoon after school ends.

The Home Office would like to see a greater police prescence outside the
gates of problem schools. Metropolitan police figures show that 30% of
offences committed by youths in 2000 took place between 3pm and 6pm. There
is no evidence of increased offending during school holidays.

The most prevalent offences were shoplifting (17%), criminal damage valued
at between UKP20-UKP5,000 (9.6%), possession of cannabis (8.9%), robbery of
personal property (10%), unauthorised taking of motor vehicle (8.3%) and
burglary (5.1%). Sixty-three per cent of the youth offences in the Met were
committed by 15- or 16-year-olds.

Ministers want a big improvement in the quality of data to help police to
tackle youth crime hot spots.

They have also been studying emerging findings from Her Majesty's
Inspectorate of Constabulary, which has warned that the police are
suffering from a "dearth of analysis that helps identify what works and why".

The report admits that the Home Office and the police service have
struggled to develop a mechanism for measuring a clear relationship between
money put into the service, police methods, and the outcome in terms of crime.

It says: "The arguments put forward by chief officers and police
authorities for more resources ... are undermined by an inabilty to state
with sufficient precision what quantifiable benefits will flow from these
resources."