ABSTRACT
The ‘New Labour’ government that swept to power in 1997 did so with the promise of transforming youth justice in England and Wales. Tackling youth crime and disorder was identified as a principal plank of public policy upon which the government's fortunes in office would hinge. After 18 years of opposition the Labour Party was keen to distance itself from earlier ‘law and order’ policies which had come to constitute an electoral Achilles heel. After the defeat in 1992, key figures in the Labour Party set about constructing an embryonic package of ‘law and order’ policies. This was promoted by Tony Blair, while Shadow Home Secretary, who in 1993 first used the slogan: ‘Tough on crime; tough on the causes of crime’. This catchphrase evocatively suggested a break with a ‘soft on crime’ stance traditionally associated with Labour. It marked a watershed in so far as it broke with discourses associated with both the traditional Left, of societal responsibility for crime, and the Right, which emphasized individual responsibility for crime. Labour's subsequent election victory, therefore, was supposed to signal a new dawn in youth justice.
