ABSTRACT
As was evident from Chapters 3 and 4, the Children Act 1989 represents the linchpin for the development of an effective multi-agency youth crime prevention strategy. However, the effectiveness of the Act is unfortunately limited by the all-embracing vagueness of its provisions, which leave it to each local authority to define and finance the work they undertake. Each day, local authorities and their child welfare professionals translate the words of the 1989 Act and its related Guidance into practice by engaging in the process of supporting families and protecting children. Each local authority must determine issues such as whether the child is ‘in need’; whether the child is suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm; what action must be taken; whether courts should be petitioned; and whether out-of-home placements are necessary. These decisions determine whether services are delivered or denied, whether children stay in foster care or return to once-abusive parents, whether families are housed or not, and whether troubled teenagers are sent to counsellors or to court. How these decisions are made will inevitably influence how local authorities discourage and divert children from engaging in offending behaviour. Given their impact on youth crime prevention, it is important to understand these decision-making processes as they occur in practice.
