Gallagher Martin: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Gallagher Martin: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:621;Page:16604] 
8.  
MARTIN GALLAGHER (Labour—Hamilton West) 
 to the  
Minister of Justice 
: Is he satisfied that youth offending teams are achieving the purpose for which they were established? 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Justice) 
: 
 Yes the Police the Department of Child Youth and Family Services the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education are now working together much more effectively in responding to youth offending which was one of the purposes of setting up the teams. In the member’s own electorate of Hamilton the youth offending team there is a model example. The agencies now work together as a team instead of as in the past with at-risk youths dealing with a series of authorities none of which were talking to one another. The new joint initiatives from the youth offending team are now delivering outstanding results and the youth offending team has won very strong community support because of that. 
Martin Gallagher 
: What programmes run by the Hamilton youth offending team does he believe have been particularly effective especially in view of his recent trip to Hamilton? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: I think the programmes run by the agencies to share information and to coordinate case management of youth have been particularly effective. What has also been working really well are programmes designed to tackle the causes of offending such as truancy suspension and expulsion from school educational failure and drug and alcohol abuse. Finally what has been really effective has been the use of alternative action or diversion programmes. The number of offenders successfully completing those programmes has doubled; and the numbers failing to complete the plan have fallen to around 3 percent. That is an outstanding result. 
Marc Alexander 
: Is the Minister satisfied that family group conferences lead to effective outcomes for young offenders when a Blenheim youth involved in the repeated burglary and assault of an 88-year-old World War II veteran who had recently admitted his guilt in a family group conference then subsequently denied it in court; or does he agree that getting offenders to own up in these conferences is pointless unless it is also accompanied by swift punishment that actually provides consequences for their actions? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: Like any form of justice and punishment we do not get 100 percent success. What is really good about family group conferences is that they deal with the hard-core offenders and they succeed in more than half of the cases in either preventing reoffending or only further minor reoffending. If the members opposite who are speaking from the depths of their own ignorance would like to read the report  
Achieving Effective Outcomes In Youth Justice 
 they would find good results. When we take a matter to a family group conference rather than to the Youth Court in fact the victim is most likely to achieve reparation and an apology that do not come through the Youth Court process the level of reoffending is less and it is seen by both the victim and the offender not as a soft option but as a more effective option for both the victim and the offender.