Crime Reduction - Helping to Reduce Crime in Your Area

The Crime & Disorder Act 1998 established Youth Offending Teams and reducing youth offending is a key element in the Government’s Crime Reduction Strategy. At the heart of the strategy are the actions we are taking to ensure that every local Crime & Disorder reduction partnership and police force is performing to their maximum potential.

Effective information sharing arrangements are the key to establishing effective partnership working in any sphere and this guidance note produced by the Youth Justice Board  specifically for Youth Offending Teams, provides detailed guidance on:

• developing local information sharing protocols

• clarifying the purposes for which information needs to be shared and who should be consulted

• alerting agencies to the need to share information to protect the public from harm

• relevant legal considerations in sharing information

• Youth Offending Team’s duty to notify the Information Commissioner

The guidance has been produced in consultation with a number of practitioners, Youth Offending Teams and the Information Commissioner. It will also be of interest to other Crime and Disorder Partners and practitioners in identifying key issues, considerations and approaches to establishing effective information sharing arrangements.

A hard copy version of the note will be distributed to all Youth Offending Teams in the near future.

Download Information Sharing – Guidance for Youth Offending Teams PDF (76 KB)