Wanting a job, she tried to achieve these extra qualifications. However, Karen found that starting an HNC, a higher education course, would end her eligibility for Housing Benefit. This would not have been the case had the course been part of further education. Karen could not improve her qualifications, and her chances of getting a job, unless she was prepared to sleep rough. The system as a whole was also widely regarded by the young people we spoke to as unapproachable and unsympathetic, and as a result can act to disempower, rather than empower, young people.
Criminal justice is another area of central importance to excluded young people.
The relatively early entry into the adult criminal justice system at 16 is often a difficult, traumatic and damaging experience for the young person involved. Whilst we accept that there will be times when this is appropriate, on the whole we believe that involving young offenders in the adult criminal justice system at this stage can be very damaging for the vulnerable young people involved, leading to, for example, increased offending, violence or drug abuse. We witnessed examples where retaining young people in the Children's Hearings system and providing additional support led to a dramatic reduction in a young person's offending, a reduction which would not have happened, according to the young people themselves, had they been involved in the adult criminal justice system. Indeed, many felt that if they had passed on to the adult criminal justice system their offending would have risen, not fallen, and that the seriousness of their crimes would have escalated. More generally, we believe that young people do not receive equal treatment under the criminal justice system - largely reflecting societal attitudes to excluded young people.