8.2.5 Core Assets

1.	According to the National Standards for Youth Justice (2000), Asset must be completed for all young people subject to: bail supervision and support; a request for a court report (pre-sentence report and specific sentence report); community disposals during the assessment, quarterly review and closure stages; custodial sentences at the assessment, transfer to the community and closure stages (NS 4.1)
2.	Full guidance on Asset completion can be found in the Youth Justice Board publication ‘Asset – an Assessment Framework for young people involved in the youth justice system’. This document details the local arrangements for Asset completion and updating,. Paragraphs marked ‘NS’ indicate a requirement under current National Standards (April 2000).
3.	The young person must be invited to complete the Asset self assessment form and be given any necessary assistance to do so. (NS 4.6)
4.	All assets must be reviewed and updated at the appropriate specified intervals and must be completed at the end of the intervention. (NS 4.11) For orders over three months in duration the asset must be reviewed every three months.
5.	Initial and final assessment scores must be analysed quarterly and the data reported to the Youth Justice Board via quarterly returns. (NS 4.12) The belief underpinning this process is that through effective interventions the risk factors should be reduced and this will be reflected in the final asset score. It is one means by which the team can demonstrate its effectiveness.
6.	To date the onus on asset completion has been with the responsible officer and overall responsibility will remain with that individual. However , staff with specialist knowledge should be able to provide assistance regarding particular sections of Asset (e.g. health, education or substance misuse) which will support a more comprehensive and holistic view of the young person and their circumstances.
7.	As assets are developed across time they should also provide a summary of a young person’s situation, what interventions have taken place and the outcomes.
8.	With all these expectations and requirements to consider the following process will be followed; The start asset will, in the main, be completed by the case holder although they may seek at this stage input from specialist colleagues. When it is completed the case-holder will ‘lock’ which means it cannot be amended and this will be seen as the final Initial Assessment document. The start asset will be cloned. It can be labelled as a review asset or end asset depending on the nature of the order. Over the next three months any worker engaged with the young person should update the asset with key pieces of information or developments, for example, the completion of a substance misuse intervention, or a referral to an external agency, the starting of a new job or school placement. Each addition must be dated so it provides a clear record of change. At the end of three months the responsible officer in consultation with any other involved workers and wherever possible the young person and parent/carer, will review the asset and make any necessary changes to the risk scores. If the order is now completed the asset should be identified as an end asset and associated with the start asset on Careworks. Where the order continues the review asset should be locked, cloned and the new cloned document used to record key events of the next three months and so forth.
9.	Should a new order be made on a young person the last available asset can be cloned to form the basis of the new start asset. If the above process has been followed it should a summary of previous interventions and events which will assist and speed up the new assessment process.

End