International Symposium on Child Protection and
Measures Alternative to Prosecution: Experiences of Six Overseas Countries

In Hong Kong, with the possibility of raising the age of criminal responsibility from seven to ten, there have been calls for different intervention models to offer adequate legal safeguards for children or to encourage them to take their responsibilities. Many innovative measures have been developed in the West, of which reparation-oriented reactions and restorative justice are the most popular measures alternative to prosecution. Victim-offender mediation, community service and family group conferencing are being developed, and considered as possible ways to avoid further re-penalization. The symposium will draw together a group of international experts to inspire us on alternatives to prosecution in overseas countries.

Date  25 February 2003 (Tuesday)

Time  9:00am - 5:15pm

Venue  Multi-media Conference Room, 4/F Cheng Yick-chee Building, City University of Hong Kong

Organisers  Youth Studies Net and Department of Applied Social Studies, City University of Hong Kong

Guest of Honour  Mrs Carrie Lam, J.P., Director of Social Welfare, Social Welfare Department

The speakers are:

• Professor James Dignan (England and Wales),
• Dr Gabrielle Maxwell (New Zealand),
• Dr Alfred Choi (Singapore),
• Professor Nicholas Bala (Canada),
• Dr Eric Chui, Mr Jason Kidd and Mr Cameron Preston (Queensland, Australia) and
• Professor Lode Walgrave (Belgium and the European Continent).

Biography of Speakers

James Dignan is Professor of Criminology and Restorative Justice at the Centre for Criminological and Legal Research. His main research interests encompass English and comparative penal policy and juvenile justice policy, and he has written extensively on each of these topics. He is also an internationally recognized expert on restorative justice, and has carried out many evaluations of restorative justice projects. He has participated in the national evaluation of pilot Youth Offending Teams for the UK Home Office. He is also internationally known for his work on penal policy and is the co-author of The Penal System: An Introduction (Calif.: Sage, 2002), which is the leading text on the penal system and of Criminal Justice 2000: Strategies for a New Century (Wincester: Waterside Press, 1999).

Gabrielle Maxwell has a distinguished academic record involving both research and consultancy. She provides policy advice to the United Nations and to Governmental and non-Governmental organisations both within New Zealand and internationally. She is Director of the Crime and Justice Research Centre at Victoria University of Wellington. Previous posts have been with the Office of the Commissioner for Children, the Department for Justice and the University of Otago. Published papers include ones which describe the New Zealand youth justice system, evaluate it in terms of meeting its objectives, examine the extent to which family group conferences are effective in reducing reoffending and consider the extent to which they are effective internationally. She has recently completed a major study of "Achieving effective outcomes in youth justice in New Zealand". Other recent work has focussed on family violence, crime prevention and children's rights.

Alfred Choi is an Associate Professor at the School of Communication Studies, Nanyang Technological University (NTU) where he served as a Sub-Dean for about six years. Prior to joining NTU, he taught at the National University of Singapore sociology department for five years. He serves on a number of committees that address national policies and public issues, such as the Inter-Ministry Committee on Youth Crime, National Crime Prevention Council, Probation Committee, and Advisory Panel on Youth Research. He has conducted a wide range of research and consultancy for the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Community Development & Sports and National Youth Council. The book that he co-authored in 2002 with Dr T. Wing LO (City University of Hong Kong) entitled, Fighting Youth Crime: Success and Failure of Two Little Dragons (Singapore: Times Academic Press, 2002), examined the problems of youth crime in Singapore and Hong Kong and strategies for effective handling of the problems.

Nicholas Bala is a professor at the Faculty of Law at Queen's University in Kingston, Canada. He has law degrees from Queen's and Harvard. He is an expert in Family and Children's Law, focussing on such issues as juvenile justice, child witnesses, divorce, domestic violence and the legal definition of the family. He has been a consultant on youth justice issues to the Canada's federal government and to aboriginal groups, and has been a witness before Parliamentary Committees dealing with youth justice reform. He is a member of the Youth Justice Education Planning Committee of Canada's National Judicial Institute, and is a volunteer at a local youth diversion programme. He is the author of numerous articles on youth justice, and recently coedited Juvenile Justice Systems: An International Comparison of Problems and Solutions (Toronto: Thompson Educational, 2002).

Eric Chui has recently been appointed as an Assistant Professor in the School of Law at the City University of Hong Kong. Before joining the Law School, after his PhD at Cambridge, he held lecturing positions in the Department of Social Work and Probation Studies at the University of Exeter (UK), and in the School of Social Work and Social Policy at the University of Queensland, Australia. His areas of interest include social work with young people and offenders, and criminology and criminal justice. He had worked as a leader of an outreach social work team to deal with at risk youths and young offenders in the community. Recently he has been appointed as an Associate Fellow of the Centre for Criminology at the University of Hong Kong, and a University Honorary Fellow of the Unit for Research on Community Safety at the University of Exeter.

Jason Kidd is currently employed as the Coordinator of the Community Conferencing Service Brisbane City, Department of Families, in Queensland, Australia. Prior to this he worked as a conferencing convener, and then in a senior programme development position in conferencing. Jason's academic qualifications include Bachelor of Laws and Bachelor of Social Work (First Class Honours) at the University of Queensland and he is now working towards the completion of a Master's degree in Social Work by Research on the topic of "Restorative Social Work".

Cameron Preston is a Detective Sergeant with the Queensland Police Service in Australia. He currently works in the area of juvenile aid and criminal investigations and has done so for the past nine years. Cameron's academic qualifications include Master of Arts (Justice Studies), Bachelor of Arts (Justice Studies & Law Enforcement), the Advanced Diploma of Investigate Practices and the Advanced Certificate in Policing.

Lode Walgrave is Professor of Youth Criminology at the Department of Criminology and Penal Law of the Faculty of Law, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium), and director of the Research Group of Youth Criminology, doing research on youth crime, its prevention and juvenile justice. He also is chair of the International Network for Research on Restorative Justice for Juveniles. In recent years, he has published many articles and book chapters on restorative justice, especially in its relation to the law and to socio-ethical questions. He has, among others, edited Restorative Justice and the Law (Cullompton: Willan Publisher, 2002), and, with Gordon Bazemore, Restorative Juvenile Justice. Repairing the Harm by Youth Crime (New York: Criminal Justice Press, 1999).

Abstracts

Measures Alternative to Prosecution of Unruly Children and Young Persons Conference:  the Position in England and Wales

Professor James Dignan

The recent history of the English youth justice system can only be described as turbulent. One key feature of the English position is the jurisdictional split which ensures that 'offence-related' issues are handled separately - legally and institutionally - from 'care-related' issues.

Following recent (post 1997) reforms to the 'offence' side of the dual jurisdiction the previously influential 'minimum interventionist' philosophy has been replaced by a 'neo-correctionalist' approach. The key features of this new youth justice agenda include the principles of 'early' and 'effective intervention' to prevent crime, linked to a strategy that is aimed at 'responsibilising' young offenders, those at risk of offending, and also their parents.

With regard to offenders under the current age of criminal responsibility (10) two new non-criminal measures have been introduced - the 'child curfew order' and the 'child safety order', which are intended to deal with pre-delinquents.

With regard to young offenders who are between the minimum age of criminal responsibility and the age of majority, the previous non statutory system of cautioning has been radically overhauled and placed on a much more statutory footing. The new system of 'reprimands' and 'final warnings' is much more restrictive, though it does also incorporate elements of a restorative justice approach.

This leaves the 'care jurisdiction' to be administered entirely separately by a system of lower civil courts known as 'family proceedings courts', a state of affairs that has fuelled criticisms alleging a lack of integration between the two jurisdictions and their supporting institutions.
 

Alternatives to prosecution for young offenders in New Zealand

Dr Gabrielle Maxwell

Since 1989, the New Zealand youth justice system has emphasised diversion from courts and custody, and responses that aim to provide for the rehabilitation and reintegration of young people, support for their families, and that take into account the needs of victims.

When a young person offends the Police can respond by: issuing a warning not to reoffend; by arranging informal diversionary responses after consultation with victims, families and young people; by making a referrals to Child Youth and Family Services for a family group conference; or by laying charges in the Youth Court. The Youth Court will refer matters to a family group conference before making a decision and will prefer decisions that respond to victims, and keep the young person in the community and enhance their wellbeing.

At the heart of the system lies the family group conference which enables those involved in the life of the young person and victims of offending to be involved in decisions that aim to ensure accountability, repair harm and enhance wellbeing. Evaluation has shown the system is largely successful in achieving its goals and, when these are met, in reducing reoffending and promoting the wellbeing of young people who have offended.
 

Measures Alternative to Prosecution of Children and Young Persons: Law and Policies in Singapore

Dr Alfred Choi

Significant developments have been made in Singapore in recent years with regards to the handling of children and young persons who have come into contact with the law. The present paper focuses on three diversionary measures that will enable the children and young persons concerned to avoid prosecution but at the same time ensure that they receive proper supervision and rehabilitation.

The first measure being examined, the "Guidance Proramme", involves a policy where young offenders are given a chance to receive supervision and counselling programmes in lieu of prosecution. The second measure being reviewed is the "Streetwise" programme where young persons affiliated with gangs receive help from the police and youth workers to leave their gangs. The final measure relates to the Children and Young Persons Act amended in 2001 that further empowers the ministry and youth workers to provide rehabilitative measures to the children "Beyond Parental Control".

All three measures not only provide effective ways to divert young persons from formal judicial proceedings but also ensure that they can receive rehabilitative treatments.
 

Dealing with Child and Adolescent Offenders Outside of the Youth Court System: The Canadian Experience

Professor Nicholas Bala

In 1984, the minimum age of juvenile court jurisdiction in Canada was raised from 7 years to 12 years of age. The most common response to offending by children under 12 is the police informing the parents and encouraging voluntary action. In the most serious cases or if there are abuse or neglect concerns, the child protection authorities may respond. In some communities there are special programs directed towards child offenders under 12, but participation is generally voluntary. There has been criticism of the raising of the minimum age, with proposals to lower the age to 10, and suggestions for more effective legal responses for child offenders.

There are a number of different types of programs operated by police and community groups to deal informally with young offenders (12 years to 17) outside the courts. There is great variation across the country in the use of informal responses to youth crime, but generally informal responses are used only with minor, first offenders and Canada makes more use of the formal court processes for adolescent offenders than other countries. The high reliance on court-based responses to youth offending is expensive and associated with a high rate of use of youth custody. The new Youth Criminal Justice Act (in force April 2003) is intended to significantly increase the use of diversion, including more use of police or prosecutorial screening, conferencing and community based programs. An expeditious, informal response is often preferable to a formal court response for many adolescents, parents, and victims, but there is little Canadian research on whether diversionary schemes actually reduce recidivism.
 

Treatment of Child and Juvenile Offenders in Queensland, Australia - Alternatives to Prosecution

Dr Eric Chui, Mr Jason Kidd and Mr Cameron Preston

Over the past few decades, there has been a great deal of public concern regarding the use of formal court process for dealing with juvenile offenders. There is also scrutiny of the effectiveness of the criminal justice responses in reducing juvenile crime. Whilst some, mostly academics and liberals, comment harshly on the 'unnecessary' early intrusion of the State into children's lives, others, especially the Conservatives, would like to see children who break the law being punished instead of getting off (see Goldson 2000). So, what is the best method of dealing with at-risk children and juvenile offenders? Shall we attempt to divert young people away from the formal juvenile justice system? Shall we impose harsher punishment to deter unruly children from re-offending? These vexed questions pose a number of challenges for criminal justice personnel in determining the most appropriate measures in working with vulnerable children and young people.

In this paper, the authors discuss the main institutional responses to children and young people who are convicted of offences in Queensland, Australia. The age of criminal responsibility in Queensland is 10, and the Juvenile Justice Act 1992 applies to young people aged between 10 and 16. Children under 14 years are not presumed to be criminally responsible, unless it can be proved that they had the capacity to know their act was wrong (see also O'Connor and Chui 2002). At present, the three diversion programmes diverting young offenders aged from 10 to 16 from prosecution and/or sentencing are cautioning, drug diversion and community conferencing. Cautioning is operated by the Queensland Police Service; drug diversion is administered by the Queensland Department of Health; and community conferencing is administered by the Department of Families. The Department of Families also operates the Youth and Family Support Service which is an early intervention programme for children and young people. To address the unruly misbehaviour of those aged below 10, the police implement informal Behavioural Counsels. The details of each measure will be discussed and their effectiveness will be examined with reference to the available research evidence.
 

Juvenile Justice in Belgium

Professor Lode Walgrave

In Europe, as in most countries in the world, the juvenile justice systems are under heavy pressure. The priority given to the welfare oriented approach is often considered to be inefficient, legally poor and inveracious for serious offending. In response to these critiques, the way is to seek for models which

• encourage juveniles to take their responsibilities
• include victims' needs for reparation
• offer adequate legal safeguards.

Currently, several experiments are going on, of which reparation-oriented reactions are the most renovating ones. Victim-offender mediation, community service and recently also conferencing are being developed, and considered as a possible way to avoid further re-penalization of the response to youth crime. Restorative justice as a more comprehensive view on doing justice is a crucial foundational inspiration for these experiments. The talk will highlight these experiments, and the results of research which is being carried out.