On 10 February 2021, the first grantmakers signed up to IVAR’s eight commitments to funding charities in an open and trusting way. One year on, over 100 trusts and foundations are working actively with each other and with charities to make these commitments a reality.

Looking back, we are struck by six imperatives that shape this work and will help drive it forward in 2022 and beyond.

1. Change is urgent

COVID-19 has been a wake-up call on funding practice. Its key challenges to funders – relieving pressure on charities; freeing them to respond flexibly to the evolving needs of the communities and causes they serve; and facing up to biases and assumptions that perpetuate entrenched injustice and inequity – long predate the pandemic. But events of 2020 – the first COVID-19 lockdown and the murder of George Floyd – showed that communities’ needs are evolving; and funders’ responses demonstrated that change is possible. The time for a simpler, more respectful, and more inclusive philanthropy is now. We all need to play our part in building greater momentum.

2. Charities must be the judge of progress

A strong, diverse charity voice is critical to this effort – but hard to achieve. Power dynamics mean charities are wary of giving robust feedback to funders. And too often new rhetoric makes little or no difference to what funders do in practice. With extreme pressure on capacity and widespread cynicism about the influence they have, many charities see no point in engaging. We will all benefit from broader and deeper conversations between the charity sector and the funding sector. But only if these conversations lead to visible and meaningful change.

3. Confident practice comes from deep roots

Even small changes in practice by grantmakers – a more streamlined application form, the opportunity to pick up the phone and ask a question, quick replies to emails – make a real difference to charities. But open, trusting and respectful practice cannot flourish unless it mirrors and is supported by organisational culture, structure and leadership. In a busy foundation, it can be hard to step back and scrutinise – at all levels – how well-established assumptions and ways of working are supporting the commitment to be more open and trusting. But this is an essential step in achieving the best possible alignment between ‘how we do things’ and ‘what we are trying to achieve’.

4. ‘Making our thinking visible’ is a powerful mechanism for change

Thinking out loud with each other provides an opportunity for people to offer alternative perspectives or identify the powerful questions that enable action. By working together, sharing ideas, difficulties and experiences in a spirit of positive challenge, we are all encouraged to act, learn and do better next time.

5. Acting like a partner, not an auditor

Open and trusting grant-making calls for a new mindset – one that starts from the assumption that charities know their own business, and will make informed judgements about how to adapt and adjust as things change. They can be trusted to be thoughtful and reflective, to know what ‘success’ looks like, to collect useful data, and to share it as part of their own commitment to improve the quality of what they do. A trusting relationship is ultimately about shifting power, not shifting paperwork. And the single most powerful thing funders can do to be more trusting is to give charities greater control over their own spending and reporting through unrestricted or highly flexible grants.

6. Making good progress means ‘starting from where we are’

Independent grantmakers are far from uniform in their scope, size, interests, priorities and governance. They face different opportunities and constraints. Being more open and trusting does not look the same everywhere – one size does not fit all. But, together, we are uncovering the principles that frame an open and trusting approach, enabling funders of all kinds to start from where they are and take positive steps to improve.

Now is the moment for transformative change in UK grant-making. To achieve this, funders, charities and their learning partners will all need to be persistent, determined and in it for the long term.

IVAR Trustees and staff are committed to supporting this momentum for change. Please join our Open and Trusting grant-making community by signing up to through our webpage or getting in touch. Charities can  hold funders to account by signing up here.

With thanks to Shaady Salehi at Trust-based Philanthropy and to our community of open and trusting grantmakers for helping to inform and develop our thinking over the last year.

This blog is cross-posted from the IVAR website.

To help funders understand where their grants are going, and to provide a baseline against which to measure change, the Alliance developed an audit tool which can be used by funders of any size, type or specialism to analyse the extent to which their grants are supporting the race equality sector and furthering racial justice. In May 2021 we published the pooled results from the pioneers who tested the audit tool, and we have now added those from the second cohort.

The first cohort included a variety of charitable funders, including social justice funders such as the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust and Barrow Cadbury Trust, a community and place-based funder, – Bedfordshire and Luton Community Foundations – as well as some bigger foundations including Esmée Fairbairn, Paul Hamlyn and Lloyds Bank Foundation.

The second cohort includes the National Lottery Community Fund, Henry Smith Charity and the People’s Health Trust, amongst others, illustrating the significant uptake of the audit tool amongst a wide spectrum of charitable funders.

Here are the results from both cohorts, which have been combined to reduce biases and give a better overall picture of where funding is going.

Racial justice funding over time

There are some notable differences in the results from the two cohorts. In the first, almost a quarter of the total grant funding provided was designed to benefit Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic groups, compared to only a tenth from the second. Interestingly though, the proportion of funding allocated to organisations led by Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities was almost identical – 6% in the first cohort versus 5% in the second.

These figures are both much lower than we’d expect if funding were to be equitably distributed across the whole voluntary and community sector.

The second big difference is the amount of funding going to the race equality sector for service provision compared to campaigning and influencing work. Almost 80% of the funding in the second cohort went to race equality organisations for provision of direct services, compared to less than half in the first cohort. However, a very different pattern was found when we looked at campaigning and influencing work – almost a fifth of grant funding in the first cohort was given to support campaigning with a full half devoted to work aimed at creating structural change, but the funders in the second cohort spent less than 1% on this work.

The pattern will partly be due to timing – the second cohort analysed their grants during or after the big push to provide crisis grants given to help people through the Covid-19 crisis – but the second cohort may also be more typical of the foundation sector as a whole, which tends to fund much more service provision than work that directly addresses the root causes of racial injustice.

Funders are changing their grant-making practice

It’s clear that funders are eager to understand their grant-making better. Twenty funders have shared their data with us, representing more than 3,000 grants totalling £270 million, and we know others have undertaken the audit for internal purposes only. It’s clear that their findings are helping them to think and fund differently.

For example, Lloyds Foundation identified barriers to organisations led by racially minoritised groups and introduced a 25% ringfenced fund in August 2020 for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic-led charities. Its evaluation of that fund showed that it had exceeded that target, with 38% going to those organisations.

When Trust for London audited its grants, it found that while 70% of its funding would benefit racially minoritised people, only 14% went to organisations led by people from those communities. Subsequently, they are now working up plans to make a significant investment to Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic-led organisations to increase their skills, capacity and policy influencing activities in tackling racial injustice. And the Smallwood Trust has also changed its processes and has seen its funding for the sector increase from 7% to 21% across its portfolio.

The audit has led to wider changes too: Esmée Fairbairn Foundation and the National Lottery Community Fund supported 360Giving and the Social Investment Consultancy to develop a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion data standard for 360Giving. This will pave the way for consistent data collection that all grant makers can use and which covers all protected characteristics. We hope this will lead to more consistent reporting, greater accountability and lasting change.

Looking to the future

Now that the audit is well established, the Alliance will be publishing pooled data on a regular basis. Since these first two cohorts, we have revised our racial justice audit tool to integrate it with 360Giving’s new DEI Data Standard and to update our language and terminology around communities experiencing racial inequity. This revised tool will be published shortly.

We are confident that the changes funders have made in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder, the resurgence of Black Lives Matter and the stark and long-standing inequalities brought to light by Covid-19 will show up the next time we publish audit figures. But funding behaviours and priorities have so far been reactive – we cannot continue to only fund the sector in times of recognised injustice and allow the momentum for change to seep away in the coming years. We are asking for all members of the Funders for Race Equality Alliance to commit to auditing their grant making at least every two years, to ensure a steady shift towards equity.

If you want to find out more about the Alliance or get support with undertaking the audit, please contact the Alliance Secretariat. We look forward to you joining us!

Some people may already know that Joyce Moseley’s tenure as Chair of the Transition to Adulthood Alliance (T2A) after nine years in post has now come to an end. The Alliance and The Barrow Cadbury Trust would like to thank Joyce for her work supporting T2A and dedication she has shown to its work over the years.

 We can share the news that Leroy Logan MBE will be taking over. The experience he brings from his time in policing and founding a leading youth charity will be valuable to advancing the work of T2A. Leroy will be talking more about taking up this appointment in early 2022.

 But first let us hear from Joyce Moseley OBE, outgoing Chair, and former chief executive of Catch 22. She talks to Laurie Hunte, Criminal Justice programme manager at Barrow Cadbury Trust about how she was drawn to working with young people and her time as T2A Chair.

When did you become chair of T2A?

I have been chair for nine years beginning in 2012.

 What attracted you to the role?  What motivated your interest in criminal justice and young adults?

Where to start! The interest in young adults grew out of many years’ involvement with youth justice. As a social worker from 1968 onwards I was drawn to working with young offenders and their families. Labelling theory was strong and it did seem to me nonsensical how young people were being stigmatised for years to come for the most minor offences when it was plain to see that their difficult life circumstances were the things needing attention.

Later as a Director of Social Services I helped promote the needs of care leavers as more and more research showed how they fared badly in later life. This led to the Leaving Care Act which for the first time meant help and support could be given to those over 18 to help with the transition into adulthood.

But I did reflect that when I was a young social worker care leavers were not seen ‘as a problem’. Why? What had changed? Although similar problems probably befell them in later life the act of leaving care did not present problems – there were plenty of jobs for 16 year olds, renting a room was not difficult, the army used to recruit many care leavers and there did seem to be more community based social support networks (or is that rose tinted glasses?).

So society, the economy, support infrastructure, family structures all changed in the 70, 80 and 90s making the transition to adulthood that much more difficult for the kinds of young people finding themselves in the criminal justice system. Not so of course for those going onto higher education where student accommodation, welfare support, financial and social support was still strong. No one expected students to ‘behave like adults’.

In the late 90’s I became one of the founding members of the newly established Youth Justice Board. Having been a Director of Social Services I knew what little focus there was on young offenders in local authorities generally  – elected members’ interest and therefore budgets did not naturally fall on young offenders. So whilst it was controversial to split them off from the social welfare system and put them more firmly into the CJS it did bring a research, practice and policy focus on them and their needs which had not been so strong before.

What was your work and other experience leading up to that and what was the relevance of it to chairing T2A?

As well as social work training and management of social services I also trained as a community worker and undertook an MSc in Social Research. During my stint at the YJB I made a move into the voluntary sector and I following my interest in youth justice and became the CEO of the Royal Philanthropic Society. RPS had been the organisation that set up the first residential treatment centre for young offenders in 1832! Reading their records is such an eye opener – attitudes towards and understanding of the young people was often more caring and thoughtful than one sees today. RPS merged with the Rainer Foundation which had started the Probation Service in the second decade of the 20^th century eventually  becoming Rainer. Then there was a merger with Crime Concern, the charity that had developed much of the thinking around community safety, and Catch 22 was born where young adults were the central focus of the work.

RPS had a strong relationship with various European organisations that had shared the same philosophy back in the mid 19 century. King’s School, Canterbury, led by Rainer, and funded by ESF. In the early 2000s a European conference was held at Kings School, Canterbury, led by Rainer and funded by ESF, focused on young adults. We were very conscious of lagging behind in our thinking on this age group. Many of our European partners had both welfare and criminal justice systems that did not have the rigid dividing line at 18 that the UK had, enabling them to support young adults in those crucial years when, as we know now, they are still developing many of their cognitive skills. There was an important supporter of this conference – no other than Barrow Cadbury Trust. This proved to be the early beginnings of what became T2A in 2008.

One other influence was my time as a board director of the Tavistock Clinic NHS Foundation Trust known for its therapeutic approach to mental health. An adolescent department had been established back in the 1920’s. Adolescence had always been defined by the Tavistock as up to 25 for treatment purposes. They were early adopters of a  psychotherapeutic lens that regarded becoming an adult as a developmental process, something we now have neurological research to back up.

 Did you always know you wanted to work in this field?  If so why?

I’ve always been amazed when people say, ‘I have always known I wanted to be X or Y’. How did they know that? I have tended to fall into things without much planning! Getting into university was more luck than judgment and doing sociology at London was more to do with not having a modern language O level than much else. And what did one do with a sociology degree in those days – became a social worker to change the world!

So, no I did not have a plan although some fairly turbulent teenage years might have led me to respect and empathise with the young people I have worked with over the years. The difference for me was having a strong loving family and a good education.

Going up the management ladder in social services there were some good role models who encouraged me. There were also those moments when I realised that I could do jobs as well if not better than my colleagues (mainly male!) who were going for the promotions.

 What was the situation like at T2A when you joined? I.e. what was going on politically and policy wise and in the VCS criminal justice sector?

It is a trip down memory lane to look back at my early Alliance meeting notes. Take December 2012 – Chris Grayling was promoting ‘swift and sure justice’, the government said all community orders had to include a ‘punitive element’ and austerity was starting to bite. On a more positive note, Sadiq Khan then shadow justice minister spoke at the YJB convention saying he wanted to look at the merits and cost of the youth offending services having an 18+ remit. The ‘what if’ approach to history!

At T2A we launched the T2A Pathway which has acted as the backbone of the work and I think is still worth using as a reference point.

For the VCS austerity hadn’t quite hit. The Big Society ideology saved them for a while but as cuts hit local authorities the knock on to voluntary organisations really started to bite. Social Impact Bonds were all the rage.

It was wonderful to be working with an organisation such at BCT that committed their investments for the long term and believed so strongly in the voluntary sector. That really gave meaning and succour to the Alliance, I think.

 What do you feel has been the greatest achievement of T2A in your time as chair?

Can chairs ever claim achievements? I like to think that in the early days the many discussions/debates with Max Rutherford, (the former CJ Programme Manager at BCT), helped with the thinking that went into the T2A programme. I like to think I fronted some of the public facing events well – party conference sessions, conference chairing, speaking to the Select Committee, meetings with ministers and officials. And of course chairing the Alliance meetings – making people feel welcome, asking reasonable questions when needed, thanking guests, trying to politely curtail some lengthy interventions, reading the moods of the meeting and finishing on time. I’m only sad that face to face meetings didn’t return on my watch. But who knows they might never!

 What do you think the future holds for the treatment of young adults in the CJS?

A Conservative MP told me recently not to be too pessimistic about the way things are going. A bit difficult given recent legislation, the massive cuts and yet more structural change as well as an underlying lack of care for the young adults we work with especially those from diverse backgrounds whose treatment by the CJS is shaming.

I think the MP said what he did knowing that ‘things change’ especially in politics, so one can only hope. And despite the politics there are many good things happening – the T2A message has never been stronger and heard by so many people. To make lasting and embedded change we need to make it conceivable that young adults in the CJS and all policy areas are seen as a distinct group with specific requirements. And that doing so makes economic as well as moral sense.

 Finally, what do you think you’ll miss most about being chair of T2A?

Being a part of something so right – T2A is a coherent set of policy thinking and policy ambition, backed by research and evidence backed practice.

Cross posted from the  T2A website 

Why ESG investing can work

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investing may not be a panacea for all the ills of climate change and social injustice, but it is far more than a mere placebo.  At its simplest level investors use ESG to determine the risks associated with individual investments.  Poor governance or environmental or social performance can mean a higher risk for the company, so there is a higher cost of capital.  If investors in the company can engage with management to improve their ESG ‘score’ then the risk reduces and there is a potential financial benefit for investors, as well as the bonus of an environmental and social impact.  If management will not engage with investors then there is a case for selling our shares in the company.  There is growing research that this ESG approach will benefit investors in the long term and from our own experience we have seen the lower financial returns generated by companies which we have divested from for ESG reasons.

Beyond financial gains

For some investors the financial benefit is enough, but there is a growing understanding that we also need to address these issues for the sake of the planet and people.  Many charity investors will consider how they can improve ESG at companies and look for opportunities in companies which are paying attention to ESG issues, particularly those which can demonstrate a positive environmental impact. In addition to this it is essential that we work with policy makers with the aim of creating a structural and regulatory environment that supports the transition to a low carbon economy.

UN Sustainable Development Goals and sustainable growth

A responsible investment approach can have wider benefits.  An approach which takes into account the wider issues of the UN Sustainable Development Goals will drive sustainable growth and reduce the externalities such as pollution and greenhouse gas emissions  which negatively affect national and global economies.  For long term investors in suitably diversified portfolios the overall global economic performance will influence the future value of their portfolio rather than just the performance of individual companies or sectors.

At Barrow Cadbury Trust we have limited funds and resources, but we do believe that by working with other asset owners and our investment managers we can improve our financial return and achieve positive environmental and social change.

Mark O’Kelly
4 October 2021

This is what I have particularly enjoyed while on my placement with the Barrow Cadbury Trust – I have had a chance to access reports that have drawn on information from all around the criminal justice sector, all of which can inform my practice in prison. By reading about young peoples’ experiences with the police, and with the courts, I can better understand the attitudes and perceptions of prison that young people have when they come through the gates. This paper, by Nacro, breaks down the process of how best to help a young person struggling with their identity, so they can grow into a more pro-social one, which is key to my work, and helpful for me to refer back to should I feel out of my depth. These papers are important because it is through understanding someone that I can talk to them with respect, and prevent moments of miscommunication, or omissions in judgment, that can lead to violence.

I will take the lessons from these papers, amongst others, back into my work, both using it to shape my actions and practice on the wing, and my conversations with fellow prison officers and members of staff. Discussing the day’s events in a prison is crucial, as it helps us process what we saw, and how we felt. Beyond that, I think it’s equally important to discuss how we can improve and talk about what we can do next time, to keep people safe. Preventing mistakes comes with practice, but it also comes with being ready, and informed on what’s going through someone’s head. Sometimes you don’t need to see it happen once to stop it happening a second time, you can stop it from happening at all. All these lessons, and skills, we learn, and I don’t believe we should ever forget anything we learn, only build new lessons on top of previous ones.

I want to say thank you to everyone at the Barrow Cadbury Trust for supporting me in the last two weeks; it has been fascinating to find out more about what you do, and also cheering to see the range and passion of people invested in supporting young people in our society. I hope to stay in touch with the people I have met, and hear more about the work being done to help bring about socially just change.

I want to use my blog posts as an opportunity to get more prison officers involved in the reports and research that are being published about the criminal justice sector. While working as an officer, it has been important to me to inform my practice using the most up-to-date research being conducted about my place of work. This kind of research is available to everyone to see, but often it’s thought that the only people who need to see it are policy makers, or members of parliament. This is not true! In these papers is a wealth of knowledge that can inform the frontline workers who are coming into daily contact with the people the publications are aiming to help.

As a prison officer, I come into contact with so many different people, often with very different needs, and understanding why they have those needs can often be the answer for how best to help them. Looking at papers like how to prevent young adults being caught in the revolving door, coming in and out of contact with the criminal justice system again and again, I can see the men that I work with, in the middle of that cycle themselves.

Catching them before they come to prison is ideal, but I know that it is never too late to help them break the cycle of reoffending. Research into young people who are care experienced, and LGBTQ+ people, for example, is important as it recognises and highlights the impact of different environmental experiences, such as spending time in care, or being discriminated against because of your gender and/or sexuality. This can teach frontline workers, such as prison officers, about triggers, which will help them build trust, and inform them about what people need with respect to these vulnerabilities, whether it be building a connection with someone who has found it hard to access consistent support in the care system, or researching resources that will help a LGBTQ+ person get back on their feet when they are released from prison.

Sometimes, working in a prison can feel like you have a thousand and one jobs to do at once, and having to cater for individual needs seems like an unnecessary additional burden. While I understand that feeling, I also know that by understanding these individual needs, I can predict who needs what, and this helps me manage my time better, as well as building relationships with the men. This can be as big a thing as understanding how to help someone who has just experienced a bereavement, down to just wishing Eid Mubarak to the Muslim population who have just finished fasting for Ramadan. This is the kind of good practice that highlights the importance of frontline workers who want to see change in the men and women they’re working with.

Thank you very much for reading this blog. I hope you learned something from it, and I hope you read some of the reports I linked to – especially if you are another prison officer! Even though I work with male offenders, I think the reports are just as valuable wherever you work, whether it’s the male or female estate, young offenders or adults. I’ll be writing another blog next week, which I hope you will also enjoy. See you then!

The shockwaves that followed George Floyd’s murder, the distress and anger at continuing race inequality in the UK and the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on racially minoritised communities have led foundations, like much of the third sector, to reflect as never before on what we do and how we do it.  And, for the foundation sector, how we spend our money is of course of paramount importance to us and those to whom we are accountable.  So many, probably most, funders across the UK are scrutinising their grant-making, aiming to increase their impact and extend their reach and accessibility, particularly into communities and sectors that have traditionally found it more difficult to secure funds.

The Funders for Race Equality Alliance is a peer learning, support and challenge network aiming to improve practice and increase the amount of funding going towards race equality and to Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic-led organisations, currently with 43 funders in membership.  Realising that we needed a benchmark of how members’ funds were being spent in order to measure progress, one of our first initiatives, in 2019, was to develop a straightforward racial justice audit tool that funders could use to analyse their portfolios as a first step in setting targets and developing strategies for change.

Developed by the Barrow Cadbury Trust, Lloyds Foundation, Power to Change and the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation in consultation with the Coalition on Race Equality, the audit asks funders to analyse a sample of grants in their portfolios using four key questions: is the grant going to an organisation led by and for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic people?  Is the grant intended to benefit Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic people?  What is the funding for (for example capital works, services, campaigning) and, if the grant is for race equality work, is it designed to address the root causes or the consequences of structural inequality?

Recommended reading: in September 2020, following the launch of the Home Truths report, V4CE and ACEVO wrote to the 20 largest grantmakers. We asked these funders to publish data outlining the proportion of their grants that are awarded to BAME-led organisations or projects.

Composite findings from the first cohort of 13 funders to complete the audit can be found here. Of the £122 million-worth of funding audited, 23% was for work designed to benefit Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities. A further 19% of funding would benefit Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic groups among the wider community, but was not specifically designed to meet their needs. But when we analysed the types of organisations being funded we found very much lower levels going to the Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic sector: 14% went to organisations with a mission or purpose of supporting BAME or minority communities and an even lower proportion, 6%, of funded organisations were led by representatives from the communities being served.

The numbers starkly highlight a story that we already know, that relatively little funding, even from foundations with an interest in tackling race inequality, goes to organisations led by and for racially minoritised communities. But, encouragingly, the process of auditing grant portfolios has provided a stimulus for change.  Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales introduced a 25% ring-fenced fund last August for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic-led charities; the Smallwood Trust has looked at the systemic barriers to Black and Minority Ethnic women’s groups accessing grants and has increased its funding to that sector from 7% to 21% and Barrow Cadbury Trust has set aside funds that it will use, with other foundations, to co-develop a leadership offer for the Black and Minority Ethnic criminal justice sector as part of its drive to reduce the disproportionate number of people from racially minoritised communities in the criminal justice system.

The racial justice funding audit has also catalysed wider change, with 360Giving adopting a new diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) data standard to encourage funders to collect DEI data as part of standard practice, leading to a continuous cycle of improvement.

For more information about the Funders for Race Equality Alliance, get in touch via email and follow FREA on Twitter. Please note that the Alliance does not provide funds; it is a learning network for funders.

Criminal courts should take account of age and lack of maturity when imposing sentences on people between the ages of 18-25. Guidelines say that young adults should be treated less severely when their level of psychological development makes them less responsible for a crime or increases the impact of punishment on them.

But what about the decisions courts make prior to sentence – in particular whether a defendant should be remanded in custody awaiting trial? Should age and maturity be relevant factors here?

A new report I’ve written for the T2A (Transition to Adulthood) argues that more should be done to keep young adults out of pre-trial detention. For one thing a spell in prison on remand can be just as damaging as a prison sentence – sometimes more so. Earlier this month inspectors sharply criticised the treatment of young adults in prison and, separately, argued that increased time spent on remand as a result of court delays will inevitably add to the anxieties and frustrations of individual prisoners of all ages. “A growing, and increasingly-frustrated remand population has the potential to have a serious adverse effect on the stability of prisons”.  The remand population as a whole grew by 24% during 2020.

It’s also the case that defendants should only be remanded to custody if they are likely to receive a prison sentence in the event of conviction. As sentencing guidelines make prison terms less likely for under 25s than over 25s, maturity should be taken into account at the remand stage too. But it seldom is.

As the Sentencing Council has recognised, many young people who offend either stop committing crime, or begin a process of stopping, in their late teens and early twenties. Therefore, a young adult’s previous convictions may not be indicative of a tendency for further offending. This is an important consideration for courts to take into account when considering risk.

Young Adults on Remand finds that – until the pandemic at least – the last ten years have seen a welcome fall in the use of custodial remands. But there is scope for both the CPS and judiciary to incorporate a greater recognition of maturity factors in relevant guidance on remand decision-making for practitioners. Courts in particular should adapt their ways of working to ensure a fairer and distinct approach to young adults at the remand stage.

Magistrates who routinely deal with children in the youth court may place a higher weight on maturity on the occasions when they sit in the adult court. But youth magistrates (about 15% of JPs) may not always be able to persuade their adult court colleagues of its significance. The view that “he’s 18, he’s old enough to know what he’s doing” is still heard.

Pre-trial arrangements are very different for under 18s and today’s report argues that the welcome policy of further restricting the use of custodial remands for children should be extended to young adults. In the shorter term, there is a case too for removing young adults, as well as children, from the remit of the emergency law extending custody time limits during the pandemic.

If custodial remands are to be reduced, sufficient services will be needed to support and supervise young adults on bail, whether from the probation service, local government, NHS or voluntary organisations. And bail information schemes need to ensure that courts are made aware of non-custodial options in individual cases.

The local authority may have continuing responsibilities for young adults who have been in their care and may be able to contribute support which could help secure bail. The report suggests that transferring budgetary responsibility for young adult defendants to a more local level – as is the case for under 18s – could stimulate better provision of community-based measures, including suitable accommodation. Current bail hostel arrangements are inadequate.

The report also recommends that more is done to monitor bail and remand decision-making in respect of young adults to inform efforts both to reduce custodial remands overall and tackle any disproportionate use for black and minority ethnic defendants.

Thanks in large part to the determined and longstanding work of the Barrow Cadbury Trust, recent years have seen a growing consensus that young adults aged 18-25 require a distinct and tailored approach from the justice system. Making the necessary changes to law, policy and practice has been a slow and chequered process. Remands are an area where the pressures of the pandemic could help to accelerate progressive change.

This blog on racial justice in the VCS comes from Jeremy Crook OBE, Chief Executive of BTEG.  It was planned as one of our 2020 centenary blogs.  December’s Covid-related events pushed it into January – but it’s much too good to miss. 

The Trust has had a strong involvement in racial justice issues over many decades.  But this is a challenge to our own governance and management, and we are very aware that our board and senior management team are not sufficiently racially diverse.  In a majority family governed foundation, racial diversity is an issue, and working with a  small staff team we can only make new appointments when posts become vacant.  The board has not been monochrome over the past five years and  we are committed to increasing our Black and Minority Ethnic membership in the coming year.  This has been written into our performance objectives as a Chair and a Chief Executive and we are currently working on it.
Erica Cadbury and Sara Llewellin
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The Black Training and Enterprise Group (BTEG) was set up 30 years ago. We focus on helping children and young people succeed in education, employment and minimising their involvement in the criminal justice system. As one of the longest serving chief executives of a national charity, I want to reflect on how the conversation on race equality has changed in the voluntary and community sector (VCS).

I joined the VCS in the early 1980’s by volunteering for the Afro-Caribbean Youth Council, a charity in Walsall. The driver for its creation was social exclusion of black youth from mainstream organisations, school exclusions, lower educational attainment, youth unemployment, access to housing and police racism.

Race equality always felt like a peripheral issue in the VCS and was only supported by a handful of charitable trusts. The VCS was content to support race inequality initiatives if it did not reduce the resources available to the mainstream sector.

Last year an explosion of global anger was ignited by the killing of George Floyd in broad daylight on a public street by a group of police officers. Many parts of the world were awakened to how people of African origin are treated by the police, at work, on the streets, in the media, in the justice and political systems. The Black Lives Matter movement gave voice to more black people, many of whom have suffered in silence and/or been under-valued in the workplace for many years.

Reinvigorated scrutiny of the VCS highlighted that the presence of black and Asian people at senior levels in the VCS is extremely poor. There are some black and Asian individuals leading large charities and charitable trusts but, overall, their representation at senior levels is inadequate. According to ACEVO only 3% of charity CEOs were from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds (2017).

It has also brought into focus what it means to be anti-racist in the VCS. Unacceptably, we still find race equality conversations in the VCS taking place without any black or Asian people present.

In the VCS the conversation shifted to discussions about the distribution of opportunities, the distribution of resources and the control of those resources. Whilst this is not the first time these issues had been considered it did feel for the first time that there was a cross-sector impetus, and more people are demanding more from their own leaders and organisations.

For much of the last thirty years [some] national VCS leaders engaged in discussions about racial inequalities but did not improve their own organisational performance. Equalities policies were adopted but there was no change in the ethnicity of those making decisions.

Young black, Asian and white people have demonstrated for change and are rightly rejecting tokenistic change in the VCS. It has been difficult, traumatic and uncomfortable, but it has provided a sense of hope that there will be change.

The issue of institutional racism has re-emerged with the usual denials that it exists in many large organisations. Structurally it would be easy to say that race equality never really featured in the core policy conversations within the VCS and, at best, it was a marginal issue often characterised with tokenistic gestures, e.g., the lone black or Asian individual employed to deliver the time limited ‘ethnic minority’ project.

In 2020 black and Asian colleagues in the VCS sector have demanded change. I think there are white leaders in the VCS that are prepared to listen and change their behaviour. They are prepared to use their influence and levers to tackle racial inequality. But there are leaders in large or influential organisations who are oblivious to the need for any change in the VCS. We all need to challenge and support these leaders to do better.

The conversation in some parts of the VCS has not changed – race equality is still not discussed. In other parts of the VCS what has changed is that the treatment of black people has been elevated up the management agenda. However, there is a risk that many white colleagues and leaders in the VCS view this as a moment and not the start of a transformation process.

Charitable trusts have also come under pressure to look at themselves and the equity of grant making decisions. Some have embraced this and have had a serious look at their organisation cultures, ethnic representation, and their relationship with black, Asian and minority ethnic organisations. Charitable trusts also have the lever of their grant making and must use this to drive change in the charities they support.

Government too has its procurement lever but has been reluctant to drive change. Large charities receive millions of pounds per year to provide public services and they should be held to account for bringing about change. For too long they have been dismissive of the need to reflect the ethnic diversity of their service users within their hierarchy. All too often black and Asian organisations have been excluded from the real decision making.

Today more importance is being placed on intersectional considerations – black and Asian individuals want to be respected and treated fairly for all their characteristics and not only in relation to ethnicity and colour. Black and Asian communities are demanding that they are not treated as a one-dimensional monolithic group.

We must be careful not to aid an inclination among leaders in the VCS to state the race equality box has been ticked now – “we’ve reviewed our policies so let’s move on now”.

Jeremy Crook OBE