Time to teach an old dog new tricks

Source: (2007) In, Report on the 2006 COnference — ‘Beyond Retribution.’ Aukland, NZ: Prison Fellowship New Zealand. pp.77-91

!us, imprisonment is used far less frequently than it was
prior to 1989 and far less frequently than it is in the adult
system. Despite this drop in sentences of imprisonment,
offending rates for young people have been stable over
the last six to eight years and have actually fallen in the
last year.6 !is paper will analyse why it is important
that the Youth Court offers alternatives to imprisonment
for young people, what those alternatives are, and will
assess the success of this system in implementing those
alternatives. In concluding that these alternatives have successfully diverted many young people away from
criminal careers, this paper will ask whether these
alternatives could be used more frequently in the adult
courts with similar positive effects. It is stressed that
this paper is restricted to young people in custody as
a result of a sentence of imprisonment or a Youth
Court Supervision with Residence order (as opposed to
those young people on custodial remand, pending final
determination of their charges). (excerpt)