At the public hearings before the Justice and Constitutional Development Portfolio Committee in February 2003, many members of civil society advocated for the inclusion of monitoring provisions in the primary legislation and the deliberations of the Committee seem to indicate that a more comprehensive monitoring structure should be included in the legislation than exists at present.

Accordingly the Inter-Sectoral Committee on Child Justice convened a workshop to discuss national monitoring structures and this was followed up by a Consultative Seminar on a National Monitoring Structure for Child Justice in Pretoria on 8 July 2003.

At the seminar there was an information session on the United Kingdom Youth Justice Board, and ideas about monitoring already on the table were discussed. It ended with a general discussion on what is needed for a national monitoring structure to be taken to the Inter-Sectoral Committee for further discussion.

The English and Welsh experience

Rob Allen, who is a Board member on the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, gave a brief account of their monitoring structures. The Youth Justice Board monitors the operation of the youth justice system and the provision of youth justice services. It advises the British Home Secretary on youth justice and the content of national standards on community and custody and prevention. It also uses a large proportion of its budget to commission and purchase secure places for children.

The Board consists of ten regional structures in England and a structure in Wales. It has a chairperson with 11 Board members and a chief executive and 150 staff members. This then monitors the regions and the Youth Offending Teams in the regions.

The Youth Justice Board's monitoring framework has evolved into four levels:

• Plans: what it intends to do and how. These plans are produced annually by the chief executive of the local authority with education and social services responsibilities. They provide information on resources and budgets and focus on targets set by the Youth Justice Board. They are monitored through assessment by the Youth Justice Board and if unacceptable, the support for a grant is withheld until the plan is acceptable.
• Outcomes: what is achieved. These include, for example, prevention and recidivism, education and training and use of secure facilities. These are monitored by obtaining quarterly, electronic data from the Youth Offending Teams and monthly data from the secure places. The data is assessed and placed on league tables for comparisons with other regions. In addition, if there is failure to provide data, then a grant can be withheld.
• Outputs: what is delivered. This includes key elements of effective practice and contract standards comprising service level agreements. The key elements of effective practice are monitored through quality assurance processes and the contractual compliance is evaluated through monitors.
• Process: what is done and by when. This includes national standards pertaining to standards of practice, quality of work and responses to non-compliance. This is monitored by independent inspections of Youth Offending Teams. However, the monitoring is infrequent and expensive and needs to be integrated with quality assurance.

Some of the achievements of the Youth Justice Board have been:

• A reduction of 22% in the predicted reoffending rate
• A reduction in the delays experienced in the criminal justice system - from 142 days to 68 days
• The development and application of a standardised assessment tool.

Despite this the Youth Justice Board has recognised that more work is needed to reduce the number of children in custody, remove girls from prisons, improve restorative justice practices and ensure children are held in detention closer to home.

The presentation highlighted many challenges that are similarly experienced in South Africa and presented the seminar with one option of how a child justice system can be monitored. The obvious problems that South Africa would encounter with such a system relate to financial resources and a lack of good statistical data, as well as electronic communication systems.

Current ideas in South Africa relating to a national monitoring structure

Ann Skelton then proceeded to brief the seminar on the development of an inter-sectoral national monitoring structure. The reasons for the development of such a structure were highlighted as being, inter alia, the following:

• Ensuring the safety of children
• Providing "alerts" to action that may be needed
• Identifying areas for increased resourcing
• Allowing for effective planning and budgeting.

It was noted that in order to set up a monitoring system the structure and systems have to be in place. For South Africa, ideas relating to structures include those at national, provincial and local levels but the questions remain as to who will staff them, what their powers will be and what resources they will have. The systems that are needed relate to data collection, analysis and research and effective interventions to resolve problems in the system.

Certain qualitative indicators of performance were then mooted as being essential for the monitoring of the new child justice system. These included:

• The use of alternatives to arrest by the police
• Release from custody before the first appearance
• The situation of children in police custody
• A comparison of recommendations for diversion with the number of actual diversions and to which programmes
• The development of diversion and alternative sentencing options.

In addition, the tracking of children will be imperative to ensure the proper functioning of the implementation of the new legislation. Children that require monitoring include:

• Children awaiting trial in custody for long periods
• Children unlawfully detained
• Children sentenced to prison inappropriately.

The seminar participants were advised that the Inter-Sectoral Committee on Child Justice is looking at a proposal for a national monitoring structure that includes:

• A core team of five departmental representatives appointed by their Director-Generals and chaired by the Department of Justice, which will meet monthly
• This will be supported by a broader team, which comprises a representative from the Office on the Rights of the Child, the Human Rights Commission and three NGOs or experts.

Proposals discussed

The participants were then requested to divide into two groups (government and civil society) and attempt to come up with some suggestions relating to a national structure.

The government group suggested a structure that:

• is 3-tiered - national, provincial and local
• includes two consultants to guide the process of monitoring - one an expert in child justice and one who is experienced in data collection and statistical analysis.

The civil society group proposed the following:

• 3-tiered structure - national, provincial and local
• the establishment of an office to provide the co-ordination and management function for the national monitoring committee and to facilitate communication and information transfers between the tiers
• the role of civil society should be advisory to the national structure, while continuing to monitor externally.

It was interesting to note that both government and civil society were heading forward with the same thought process in relation to monitoring at a national level. Both identified the need for assistance to be provided to the national monitoring structure and for strong ties between all three monitoring tiers.

The seminar will hopefully be followed by constructive discussions at the Inter-Sectoral Committee that will provide implementable proposals for the Portfolio Committee when the Child Justice Bill deliberations recommence.

The workshop also marked the launch of a new child justice web site hosted by the Department of Social Development. The keynote address was delivered by the Deputy Minister of Justice, Cheryl Gilwald, who also took the opportunity to pay tribute to the UNDP Child Justice Project for all its efforts in working towards a new criminal justice system for children.