EXPERIENCED and passionate staff in the East Sussex Youth Justice Service are helping children thrive, inspectors have found.

The partnership, which works with children and young people across the county to prevent offending or re-offending, was rated good following a recent visit by HM Inspectorate of Probation.

The report, published this week, says the service is well-led, highlights partnership working as a strength and rated nine of the 13 areas inspected ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ including leadership of the service, the dedication and commitment of staff, and the range of high-quality services in place to personalise support.

It also noted that data from the past 18 months showed a reduction in overall rate of re-offending among those children that had worked with the service.

There are areas where improvements are needed, the report says.  Inspectors found that the quality of work linked to planning for children’s safety and their potential to cause harm to others was variable.

Becky Shaw, the council’s Chief Executive and Chair of the Chief Officers Group management board, said: “Our Youth Justice Service works with children and young people at an extremely difficult time in their lives and I am pleased that the passion and efforts of partners and staff have been recognised in this report.

“The work carried out by the partnership has a huge impact on the lives of families across the county, which can be seen in the reduced re-offending rates and by the wonderful comments made by young people and their parents and carers.”

She added: “As well as seeing what we do well, inspections give us a good opportunity to take a step back and see what we can do better.  There are areas where inspectors felt improvement was needed and we are committed to doing everything we can to quickly bring about changes that will deliver a safer and more effective service to children and young people across East Sussex.”

Ends.