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British Transport Police
Force Headquarters
25 Camden Road
London
NW1 9LN
T: 0207 830 6227
27TH February 2015
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am writing to you in my capacity as the British Transport Police (BTP) lead for Criminal Justice,
with oversight of our approach to young people who come to the attention of officers and staff
on the rail network covered by BTP.
As you may know, British Transport Police is the specialist Police Force for Britain’s railways,
providing a service to rail operators, their staff and passengers across the country. We also
police the London Underground, Docklands Light Railway, the Midland Metro tram system,
Croydon Tramlink, Sunderland Metro, Glasgow Subway and Emirates Air-Line. Unlike other
Police Forces we do not police a residential community; however six million passenger journeys
a day are made on the nation’s rail network.
We have been aware that our approach and processes around young people generally has
needed review and have been working closely with the Senior Police Advisor for the Youth
Justice Board around safeguarding and offender management. In addition to this national work
BTP with the YJB and Merseyside Police has run a pilot to learn and support our development
of some new approaches in relation to the way we refer our young offenders.
The result of this work includes our re-designing the BTP Young Offender Referral Form (a copy
is attached) which will see all youth offenders being referred to local YOT’s for joint and
collaborative decision making to ensure a more consistent and appropriate response in line with
home office forces. These referrals will include all young people who we are looking to charge,
report or deal with via an out of court disposal, not only those who are to receive a second or
subsequent formal disposal. This decision should ensure where a young person is already
known to your service you are provided timely information to ensure support and interventions
can be delivered.
A number of YOT’s were consulted as part of this referral forms development to ensure the
information supplied provides the required level of detail to properly inform the best outcome.
As you will see from the referral form
recommendation and the rationale for that
your knowledge and assessment of the
recommendation and rationale is added to
from the justice units.
the officer in the case (OIC), will insert their
option and we would ask for your views based on
young person. We will be requesting that your
the form and returned to originating email address
One area still in the developmental stage for BTP is around Community Resolutions, which are
still not rolled out across our force. Having said that progress is being made and training for
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Officers to offer community resolutions has already commenced. In the interim we are seeking
yours and home office police force assistance should a community resolution be deemed the
most appropriate outcome in terms of process and delivery. Of note we are developing
education programmes to support restorative justice approaches for young offenders to address
railway safety issues in relation to acts of graffiti, criminal damage, trespass etc and will extend
the offer to all forces to refer young offenders onto these courses where appropriate.
In relation to our referral process, BTP’s two Central Justice Units will oversee this; one based in
London and the second in Birmingham. Contact details for both can be found below and we
extend the invitation to YOS staff to visit or contact us at either location. Furthermore, we will
endeavour, through local officers and staff, to attend as many YOT meetings as possible to
ensure an open dialogue and to ensure developments and updates can be provided, especially
in terms of community resolutions, restorative justice and our offender management reform
programme.
As a national police service BTP are unable to agree any to any local arrangements with
individual YOS teams, this is to ensure consistency and reduce confusion for our staff. We are
therefore adopting Ministry of Justice’s guidance of 20 working days for referral and assessment
returns. We appreciate that there may be occasions when the YOS will require more time to
assess the young person and ask in these exceptional instances that you please advise the
originating CJU who will ensure this is relayed to the OIC. Agreement to a delay may not always
be possible when the young person is on Police Bail or the statutory time limits for the offence
are close to expiring, each case will be assessed on its own circumstances.
On behalf of BTP and our staff I would like to thank you for your support and forbearance as we
have worked toward developing a more consistent approach and we look forward to working
with you. If you have any issues, concerns or comments please direct them to the contacts
below in the first instance.
London Contacts Amy Hudspith & Nicola Vallins
Email: [email protected]
Tel: 0207 027 6400
Birmingham Contact John Pyke
Email: [email protected]
Tel: 0121 781 1154
Yours sincerely
Superintendent Matthew Wratten
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