Monitoring Performance

The YJB monitors the performance of the youth justice system through the Youth Justice Planning Framework, and this is supported by the collection of performance and other data. The YJB itself no longer sets performance targets for YOTs. It is responsible for collecting and monitoring the quality of data for the six youth justice National Indicators in England and the six Wales Youth Justice Indicators, which inform Local Government assessment in terms of youth justice.

The YJB Information Team coordinates the definition of this data through the YOT Data Recording Guidance, and its collection within the Youth Justice Management Information System (MIS) [opens in new window]. One month after the end of each quarter, YOTs submit data to Youth Justice MIS. Some of the data is aggregated by YOTs and submitted as “summary-level” data, while other data for individual young people is submitted as “case-level” data. Further information on these types of data is given below.

The quarterly YOT Data Summary (YDS), one for England and one for Wales, is produced for YOTs within a month of data submission to facilitate comparative performance analysis, containing current and historic data for the youth justice indicators as well as other relevant data. It is available in the Summary-level Reports folder in the Youth Justice MIS reporting area, and on the YJB secure website. See below for further detail.

The YJB is committed to on-going initiatives aimed at reducing the reporting burden.

For all queries on YOT data, contact informationteam@yjb.gov.uk.

For technical queries or feedback on the functioning of Youth Justice MIS, email yjmis@yjb.gov.uk.

Summary-level data for 2009/10

A significantly reduced set of summary-level data will be submitted in 2009/10 by YOTs, via web-forms in the Submissions area of the Youth Justice MIS. This process replaces the returns via the Themis application. For further details of the submission process, see the YOT Data Recording Guidance page.

The new process provides continuity and allows YOTs to retain control of important data, particularly for the national indicators. Summary-level data submitted via the web-forms for the National Indicators in England and the Wales Youth Justice Indicators will inform the Local Government assessment processes. Any equivalent data derived from the separate case-level submission will not be used for this process until the YJB and YOTs are satisfied with the quality of this new source.

Similarly, data submitted via Themis prior to 2009/10 will continue to be the source from which historic performance is measured. Case-level data will not form the basis for any official performance figures relating to periods prior to 2009/10.

he types of summary-level data collected are listed below. See the YOT Data Recording Guidance for full details.

• National Indicators for England, and Wales Youth Justice Indicators
• Prevention programmes
• Priority or Prolific Offender, Deter cohort
• Knife Possession Prevention Programme
• Intensive Supervision and Superveillance Programme
• Restorative justice interventions
• YOT budget and staffing

Case-level data

From 2009/10, YOTs will also submit data on anonymised individual cases to Youth Justice MIS. This has already resulted in a reduction in the number of summary-level tables YOTs are required to submit, as standard data on offences and disposals will be derived from case-level data.

The quality of the case-level data already collected in Youth Justice MIS is high, however work remains to be done before it can replace the summary-level data. For this reason, summary-level data will continue to be the source from which official national indicator data is derived until the quality of the data has been fully demonstrated.

Any use of the case-level data is subject to the caveat that the quality is not fully assured and the data may not be accurate. A programme of work is planned for the remainder of 2009/10 to better understand data quality issues and put into place any corrective action necessary.

Youth Justice MIS users are reminded that, according to the terms of the Youth Justice MIS Information Sharing Protocol, they may not publish 'discretionary' data for individual YOTs without the expresss permission of those YOTs.

For a full list of the data items collected at case-level, see Annex C of the YOT Data Recording Guidance for 2009/10.

YOT Data Summary

The YOT Data Summary (YDS) for England is largely unchanged in 2009/10 with regards to the 2008/09 version. The YOT Data Summary for Wales is a new development, reflecting the move in 2009/10 to the Wales Youth Justice Indicators.

The YOT Data Summary is issued in draft version three weeks after the YOT data return deadline, and a final version is issued approximately one week later. The summary is then not updated until the next quarter. During the window between draft and final versions, the Information Team conducts further data quality checks and YOTs can report inconsistencies. YOTs may resubmit data up to one month after the initial submission deadline, but only data resubmitted within two weeks of the deadline will be included in the final YOT Data Summary. Where possible, resubmitted data will be reflected in the next quarter’s summary.

Note that since summary-level data for all YOTs will be available to all users of Youth Justice MIS prior to publication of the YDS, YOTs must take care if they wish to use this data, as it is subject to change. Once the YDS is published the figures it contains will be the standard figures to be used until the following YDS is produced.

Future dates for issuing the YOT Data Summary are as follows: