North Ayrshire Health and Social Care Partnership

We work with young people aged 12 to 21 years old who display problematic behaviour, including offending or sexually harmful behaviours. We aim to promote social inclusion where young people:

• reflect on how their actions affect others
• take responsibility for their actions
• make positive choices for the future

Our priorities are to:

• implement a whole systems approach including GIRFEC
• intervene at an early stage
• address causes of offending behaviour
• reduce the number of under 18s referred to courts and under 21s given custody
• support and encourage diversionary activities to reduce offending
• prevent reoffending

This is a referral service. Referrals can be made by:

• Anti-Social Behaviour Investigation Team (ASBIT)
• courts and justice colleagues
• Police Scotland
• Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration via the Children’s Panel
• social work colleagues

We work in partnership with the justice system. We liaise with court staff, inform and monitor court proceedings, and ensure non-custodial options are available that can reduce re-offending and address underlying causes of offending. We provide:

• court reports and accredited risk assessments for under 21s who appear at court
• court notes and support to under 16s who appear at court, and under 18s (if required)
• individual offence focussed interventions
• multi agency initiatives targeting young people at risk of offending behaviours
• re-integration for young people returning to their community from custody
• employability support
• sessional mentoring service

Preventing offending

We target areas of youth offending that is problematic. Prevention measures include, individual and family support services plus individual offence focused programmes.