Intensive Supervision and Surveillance Programme
Intensive supervision and surveillance
This is the most rigorous non-custodial intervention available for young offenders as part of a Youth Rehabilitation Order.
As its name suggests, it combines unprecedented levels of community-based surveillance with a comprehensive and sustained focus on tackling the factors that contribute to the young person's offending behaviour.
It targets the most active repeat young offenders and those who commit the most serious crimes.
ISS workers are part of the 3 area youth offending teams in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Stafford and Lichfield.
What are its aims?
It should:
- Reduce the frequency and seriousness of offending in the target groups.
- Tackle the underlying needs of offenders which give rise to offending, with a particular emphasis on education and training.
- Provide reassurance to communities through close surveillance backed up by rigorous enforcement.
As a possible part of a Youth Rehabilitation Order most young people will spend 6 months on ISS. The most intensive supervision (25 hours a week) lasts for the first 3 months of the programme.
Following this, the supervision continues at a reduced intensity (a minimum of five hours a week, and weekend support) for a further 3 months.
On completion of ISS the young person will continue to be supervised for the remaining period of their order.
Who needs this?
It's targeted at 2 main groups of young offenders:
- The small group of prolific young offenders (aged 10 to 17) who, Home Office research suggests, commit approximately a quarter of all offences committed by young people.
- Those young people who are not prolific offenders, but who commit crimes of a very serious nature and who would benefit from early and intensive intervention.
It is based on the best evidence as to what will reduce the frequency and seriousness of offending. It promises to bring structure to offenders' lifestyles, while systematically addressing the key risk factors contributing to their offending behaviour, such as educational deficits, weaknesses in thinking skills or drug misuse.
For serious offenders who do not meet the definition of persistence, it plans to address their behaviour before they become habitual and persistent offenders.