Introduction

This chapter focuses upon Family Group Conferencing in the youth justice arena using the ReConnect project, an FGC service based within Leeds Youth Offending service as a case study to exemplify their use in this field. The chapter does not offer a discussion on other types of restorative approaches in the field of youth justice, but there is some suggested further reading at the end for those who wish to explore restorative approaches further.

FGCs in the youth justice field sit under the umbrella of restorative justice. Restorative justice is the process of bringing together the ‘victim’ of a crime with the ‘offender’ to enable dialogue between the two parties with a focus on ‘repairing the harm’ to the victim. The restorative process is aimed at creating an outcome where the victim feels that justice has been served and that the offender is taking responsibility for their crime (Zehr, 2015). The result is a ‘personalised’ justice process because it is the ‘victim’ who determines what needs to happen for them to feel that justice has been served.

The House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, 2005–06 defines restorative justice as follows:

Restorative Justice was first introduced into the UK in the mid- 1980s, when the Home Office funded four victim–offender mediation services (Davy, 2005).

This work was developed further in 1996 with the publication of ‘Misspent Youth’, an Audit Commission document looking at the way young people were managed with within the justice system; it introduced the idea of cautions and targeted prevention work and emphasised restorative approaches as being best practice (Audit Commission, 1996).

The next significant event was the establishment of Youth Offending Teams (YOTs), following the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. YOTs were set up with the intention of reducing the risk of young people offending and re-offending, and to provide counsel and rehabilitation to those who do offend. Again, the emphasis was on restorative approaches to address the offending behaviour of young people (Williams, 2000).