The 2nd Adullam Homes Annual Lecture, 22 September 1995

"Children, Crime & Community"

Bob Holman

Introduction

Juvenile crime, and its apparent increase, has caught the concern of every generation. During the last world war, the number of youngsters found guilty of breaking the law rose by a third between 1939-41. As always, the increase was blamed on the breakdown of family life with fathers often away in the forces and many children evacuated. I must here confess that, as an evacuee, I had to leave a billet because of my stealing. The perception of rising crime and falling parental standards continues to this day.

Whether juvenile crime is rising or falling is debatable but it certainly involves several thousands of youngsters. The crimes can have traumatic effects on their victims. Further, crime spoils the offenders. I think of some previous lively club member boys who are now in and out of prison. Their lives are wasted.

At this point. I must be open about my Christian position. I believe that all people are created by and are of equal value to God. It follows that we who acknowledge God as our Lord have a duty to protect all people from criminals. Yet even criminals are God's beings. Jesus Christ was crucified between two bandits and, in his agony, still had time to listen to them. I reckon that Christians must have a concern for those considered most unworthy by society. I am thus happy to be associated with Adullam because it acknowledges that the homeless. the single parent, those with HIV and AIDS are as valuable to God as we are. Of course, followers of other religions - and of none - can argue a similar concern. Whatever our faith. I hope that collectively we will strive for a reduction of crime and the redemption of actual or potential criminals.

In this paper, I will briefly consider some explanations of delinquency and then

suggest some local responses.

EXPLANATIONS OF DELINQUENCY. THE FAMILY

So what is the cause of delinquency? I do not consider there is a single explanation. None the less, David Utting concludes from his excellent review of the research, "The tangled roots of delinquency lie, to a considerable extent, inside the family." The question then arises, what is adequate parenting?

Parenting and Delinquency

Psychiatrists like John Bowlby and psychologists like Mia Kellmer Pringle have long laid down what constitutes good parenting, namely,

a) the capacity to convey affection so that children feel loved, secured and respected;

b) the maintenance of firm, kind and consistent discipline so that children know what is right and wrong;

c) the participation in and interest in children' s leisure and educational activities so that they develop their social and intellectual skills.

The implication is that children parented in these ways are unlikely to become delinquents, and vice versa. There is some research evidence to support these claims from the surveys by criminologists Donald West and David Farrington in London and Israel Kolvin in Newcastle.

Simplifying their conclusions, they do suggest that young offenders tend to come from families where there has been a lack warm relationships, stimulation, attention, discipline, example and permanence. The are not arguing that such experiences inevitably produce delinquents. They do argue that they produce characteristics - such as difficulties in making personal relationships, trouble in controlling emotions, lack of educational skills, a reduced sense of right and wrong - which make them more likely candidates for the courts.

Yes, the roots of delinquency often do lie within the family but the way the family functions and the way children respond to the family also depend upon factors outside the family. Let's turn to some of them and, in particular, the influence of social deprivations or, to use the short hand, poverty .

THE CRIME OF POVERTY

Poverty and Parenting

During the last 16 years the number of those in poverty has multiplied. In 1992-3, 14.1 million people were living below 50% of average income. The next question is, is there a connection between poverty and crime? Certainly, an association exists. Utting's review also concluded, "Children whose families suffer financial and environmental poverty are clearly at greater risk (of offending) than those whose parents have the income to provide them with a comfortable, uncrowded home.

Obviously youths from deprived areas have a greater chance of being involved in peer groups which contain offenders. But there is more to it than that. Poverty makes parenting more difficult. In their seminal research in Birmingham, Wilson and Herbert compared a sample of large poor families with a control group in better circumstances. As expected, the poor families did contain far more children convicted of an offence. Less expected, their parents were found to be full of care for their children and to hold very similar educational aspirations and values as the more affluent parents. What went wrong?

It emerged that the low-income parents did tend to use child rearing practices which were unhelpful: they were inconsistent in discipline, they participated less in play and school, the children were allowed on the streets. Jack Straw would have applied his curfew. Wilson and Herbert explain that the parents were in such poor material conditions that they could not put their child care wisdom into operation. In small apartments with paper thin walls, a premium was placed on keeping the peace and not annoying neighbours: so often they gave in to children's demands for crisps or sweets just for the sake of peace: yet at times the parents remained firm - inconsistent discipline.

In overcrowded rooms in flats with no gardens, it was a relief if children did play outside and such a release became a habit. The parents could rarely afford the books, the toys, the outings, the holidays, which stimulate children.

The children then often fell behind at school and the parents, after early enthusiasm, stopped attending parents' nights. In turn, the children rejected school where they we seen as trouble-makers. Sometimes they g into trouble on the streets where they were picked up by the police. Parents losing control, teachers deeming the children as problems, police and social work involvement. Delinquency was afoot.

Some qualifications must be added. Crime is not restricted to poor people. After all, Nick Leeson was not exactly short of money. Further, most children of poor parents do not become habitual delinquent. But there is a link between poor parents and delinquent children. This link leads those who prefer to condemn than to understand to complain, "These parents should do better. My parents were poor but I turned out all right."

But perhaps we would be the same. Every year, I take children on holidays. One has involved an eight hour coach trip from Glasgow to Norfolk with 40 excited youngsters. Initially we leaders keep calm, tactfully sort out arguments, reason with the naughty ones, produce games, books, crayons. As the hours go by, our patience wears thin. We start to shout, we threaten, we hand out sweets, we tell them to go to sleep. Before long, our ideas of good practice have been replaced by short-term methods of keeping the peace. And if I had been a parent in continual poverty, I would probably have done the same on a long-term basis.

To sum up: juvenile crime does have some association with poor parents. But in an affluent society perhaps the greater crime is that so many families are placed in poverty.

Unemployment

Unemployment means low incomes, poverty, for many. The prime minister dismisses any connection between unemployment and crime. Yet a survey by senior probation officers recorded that 70% of serious offences are committed by those out of work. The latest Home Office research by Graham and Bowling of 1,000 young people aged 14-25 indicated that a worrying number of teenage offenders were continuing in crime: more than a quarter of the men aged 22-25 admitted to property crime with many being unemployed. Significantly. a government junior minister, Tom Sackville, has recently conceded that unemployment can breed crime.

Unemployment is associated with crime for two main reasons.

First, desperation. An unemployed young father came to confess that he had nicked my wallet from our flat: to purchase goods for his children he had borrowed from a loan shark: unable to re-pay, his knees got smashed in: he stole from me to avoid another beating. As it says in Proverbs 30 9, "If a man is rich he may think he has no need of God, but if he is poor he may steal."

Second, unemployment can lead to a sense of boredom, of futility, which finds outlets the excitement of confrontations with the police in mini riots, in stealing cars, in planning break-ins, in drug abuse. It must be said that the taking of prohibited drugs also means access into a social network o: other users, of a kind of fellowship. But drugs can also mean pain, ill-health, death Drugs are also expensive and hence users are frequently pushed into crime. Two o'clock one morning, I was woken by a dishevelled young man demanding money for drugs. When I refused he snarled, "I thought you were a Christian." Christian not I still refused and he tried to persuade me with a meat cleaver, eventually he left, was arrested in the street, and went to prison.

I have outlined some of the forces which draw youngsters into or out of a delinquent career. I have missed out some and, in particular, the influences of schools. It can be concluded that the part of the family is vital yet the way the family functions is partly shaped by external factors. Families and children are subject to peer groups, social deprivations, public values, all of which may have an adverse effect.

Yet even if we could identify all the causative influences, it must be said that every human spirit is unique. Youngster from the most favoured backgrounds ma: become criminals. And vice versa. I was delivering our community paper early in morning when a 20 year old stopped me the bus stop. His father deserted when h was young, relationships at home have n always been smooth, his step-father is in long-term unemployment. As a teenager was disruptive and unco-operative. Prediction techniques would have marked him down for delinquency. Yet since leaving school he has chased jobs, accepted very low pay in fast-food shops, sometimes gets me to act as a referee for better ones so far without success. Despite his disappointments, he has kept out of trouble. And now he told me he wanted to do something in the community and could he help in the youth clubs. Thank God for human unpredictability.

RESPONSES TO DELINQUENCY

How can and should society respond to juvenile crime? "Lock `em up. Three strikes and you're out", such are the solutions voiced by the popular press and even unpopular Home Secretaries. Certainly, there is a place for custody. Some young people are so violent, so persistently criminal that their liberty must be removed both in order to protect others and as the appropriate punishment. But the important question is, how effective is imprisonment?

In the first Waiter Moore Lecture, Brendan O'Friel, himself at that time a prison governor, pointed out that "herding large numbers of prisoners together, whose common bond is criminal behaviour, is potentially a recipe for disaster.'' Despite the efforts of hard-working staff, the latest figures show that, in 1992, 89% of those aged under 17 discharged from custody were re-convicted of an indictable or serious summary offence within two years. Sending young people down after a specified number of offences could well funnel them into a criminal environment from which they might have escaped.

How much more sensible to place an emphasis on a policy of prevention, of preventing youngsters entering or continuing in the delinquent road. I see this as double-fold.

First, national. If delinquency is associated with social deprivations, then it will be reduced - as will many other social ills - by government strategies which alleviate poverty and unemployment. To your relief, I am not going to talk about large scale government intervention although it is necessary.

Second, local, that is prevention and diversion which focuses on individuals and groups at the local level. The probation service and local authority Social Services Departments have certain responsibilities in this regard. Yet lack of resources and a concentration on child abuse cases has meant that they have been severely handicapped. Without pretending that local residents can ever replace the professionals, I wish to argue that they - members of churches, community associations, ordinary people - can contribute to the prevention of delinquency within their own localities. Therefore for the rest of this talk I will focus on the community or, to use the term I prefer, the neighbourhood.

COMMUNITY AND NEIGHBORHOOD

Community or neighbourhood action does not have to be stimulated from outside. The Community Development Foundation estimates that some two and a half million people participate in neighbourhood groups. These are not the national voluntary societies with royal patrons, highly paid chief executives and million pound turnovers. Instead, they consist of locally run efforts, particularly in deprived areas, with examples being food co-ops, credit unions, day care centres, youth projects and so on. I believe that such groups can play a part in preventing some delinquency as I hope to illustrate from my own involvement in Easterhouse.

Easterhouse

From 1976-86, I was involved in a community project on the Southdown Estate, Bath. After 10 years, all the posts were in the hands of residents and we felt nicely redundant. We moved to my wife's native Glasgow. In Easterhouse, some council flats, long empty and vandalised, were being re-furbished and sold off very cheaply. We moved in. I was soon told, "We don't like English people here - but it's better than coming from Edinburgh.'' This mixture of gruffness and humour was typical and after a while I was accepted, became involved and helped to form a neighbourhood group called FARE.

Easterhouse has recently gained much from improvements to its housing, so much so that Prince Charles brought President Chirac to see what has happened. But housing regeneration is not sufficient. Poverty remains extensive. Where I live over 80% of school children receive clothing grants, that is they come from families with very low incomes. Unemployment is massive. Of 21,900 residents of working age, only 8,800 are in the equivalent of full-time posts.

Given these social conditions, it is not surprising that crime is widespread with, in 1991, Easterhouse having a crime rate well over double that of the Scottish average.

Despite these gloomy figures, it must be added that most Easterhouse residents are ordinary, decent people who care about their families and neighbourhoods. Many involve themselves in local voluntary efforts of which FARE is one.

FARE

FARE stands for Family Action in Rogerfield and Easterhouse, Rogerfield being one of the 15 districts of this enormous housing scheme. Its committee is elected by residents. Just as Walter Moore was able to identify with the homeless because of his own experiences, so FARE's committee contains people who know what it is to be unemployed, on Income Support, surviving as a single parent. As with hundreds of similar projects it has these characteristics.

It is local. The committee, the staff, the helpers, tend to live in the area. Being rooted in the community, it is responsive to local feelings. 1995 saw a number of drug-related deaths in the area and, at the AGM, parents asked the committee to take action against drug abuse. It responded by obtaining the salary for a third staff member who started in August. He is a former rock music professional and is using music as a means of attracting in those teenagers who now find the youth clubs too wimpish and are on the verge of the drug scene.

It is small. FARE has no premises save a tiny office. Most activities take place in the schools. It has no clerical help, and cannot even afford a photocopier.

It is participative. The activities depend upon the involvement of sessional workers and volunteers who are all local residents. Neighbourhood groups undertake a bewildering variety of activities. Few make the prevention of delinquency a specific and sole objective but they do contribute to this end in the following three ways.

First, they can strengthen families. Food co-operatives, credit unions, baby co-ops, day care centres, holidays, provide practical services which relieve stress on low-income families. Credit unions mean that cheap credit is available as an alternative to the loan sharks. FARE owns a caravan at the seaside which can hold 14 for a cost of &10 a week. Holidays become possible. The nearby St George's & St Peter's Community Association runs a day care centre for 40 children a day. Noticeably, Jane Gibbons in her research on prevention, concluded, ''Parents under stress more easily overcome family problems ... when there are many sources of family support available in local communities" (1990, p. 162) With stress modified, parents can more easily give good care to their children.

Second they can run ordinary youth clubs. FARE organises around 16 youth activities a week with some 500 attendances. There are lunch-time and evening clubs in the schools, groups in the cramped office, trips in the minibus to the sports centre, swimming, skating, bowling.

What do the clubs do? They are nothing special: table tennis and pool on battered tables, badminton. darts, music, all with equipment that has to be stored or taken away at the end. For younger children, there is the enjoyment of playing with others, for older ones the chance to lounge around, chat and chat up.

What has this to do with delinquency? Some offenders attribute their waywardness to boredom, of having to hang about the streets with nothing to do. At least the junior youth clubs get some members into the habit of attending organised activities. Senior youth clubs with their discos and sports activities can provide some enjoyable and legal outlets. By attending ordinary youth clubs, members are not marked out as delinquents - the clubs are open to the neighbourhood. Yet they do also draw in some actual or potential offenders who thereby mix with peers who are not delinquents.

The advantage of ordinary youth clubs and holidays is that they do not have to be run by professionals. They do require participants who possess certain attributes such as emotional stability, some skills with young people, a capacity to work with others and endurance. My experience is that such qualities can be found amongst ordinary citizens, church members, neighbours, parents.

Resourceful Friends

The clubs also bring youngsters into contact with adults whom, over time, they can learn to trust. A few needy youngsters then relate to the adults in what I call resourceful friendship.

I met Brian when he was nine, being brought up, with several siblings, by his lone mum. He came to our clubs and to several camps. Even at this young age, he had difficulties, could be very aggressive, and with his mum's approval, I gave him a good deal of time. I drew him into small groups where I taught him table tennis and other sports at which he showed some talent.

At secondary school he was extremely difficult to control, was suspended several times then expelled. It was nearly a year before another school would take him but within a few months his truancy and bad temper caused him to be kicked out again. My aim became just to keep him out of custody and off drugs until he was 16. We succeeded -just. Now he is 18, unemployed, has an older brother who is a heroin addict, and is on the verge of crime.

This kind of personal interaction between an adult and a youngster is not clinical therapy. Yet it is more than just friendship which is usually a benevolent relationship between people in the same age range. It is a deliberately cultivated relationship, with the older person bringing concern, stability, integrity and certain skills to help the younger. Of course, the older person may gain satisfaction but the primary aim is less mutual benefit and more a concentration on the needs of the younger.

Living locally provides resourceful friends with one major advantage. They are available. Crises tend to occur In the evenings, at weekends, on bank holidays, when statutory help is hard to obtain. Of course, being available is not always convenient. One Sunday afternoon, I settled down to watch Rangers v Celtic on TV. The buzzer to our flat went and for once I told the boy to go away. A few minutes later, it went again. A neighbour shouted, "Mrs Brown is having her contractions, can you take her to maternity?" Reluctantly, I heaved the woman into the minibus. What annoyed me was that her husband refused to accompany her as he preferred to watch the game. When I got home, a boy's mother was waiting. After a family row, her son had declared he was going for good. It was the boy who had been to my door. Guilt. 'We searched but could not find him. The police were called. 10 pm he buzzed again and I was able to speak with him and get him home. I think it is essential that parents who feel they cannot cope, youngsters who have had enough, can turn to someone whom they know and who is close by.

To sum up: neighbourhood groups are not the answer to juvenile delinquency but by strengthening families, by running, youth clubs, and by developing resourceful friendships, they have an important part to play in the areas where crime tends to be highest.

A NEIGHBORHOOD STRATEGY

I will end with a case example and a brief suggestion for a neighbourhood strategy. I met Wayne 19 years ago when I worked in Southdown. In his teens he was a chronic delinquent making several appearances in juvenile court for shop-lifting, housebreaking. stealing. Living close to him, I offered him friendship within the framework of the project. I said he could call at any time. He took me at my word and called five times on one Christmas Day. I accompanied him to court and persuaded magistrates not to put him into custody. We gave him responsibility within our Junior clubs and then, when he was truanting and disruptive in his final year at school, co-operated with the teachers to give him work experience whereby he worked three days a week for the project on condition that he attended school on the other days. It worked.

But what is he like all these years later? Last year, I travelled south to visit him. I was met by him, now in his thirties, at the station and he drove me to tea at the Hilton Hotel. He is the manager of a group of shops, a houseowner, no trouble with the police. Why?

Wayne thanks the project. Certainly the many clubs he attended did play a part by filling up some of his leisure time. Probably our friendship did keep him out of custody at a crucial time and if he had been sent away he would have missed that job opportunity and he says he would have entered on a criminal career.

Perhaps more important was the fact that he obtained a satisfying job. The boss of a glaziers firm spotted his financial abilities and he was given managerial responsibilities. What was the point of nicking after that? Next, he was able to afford marriage and family.

The key elements in helping Wayne were the youth services and employment. In 1996 youth amenities and jobs are less available. I therefore argue that neighbourhood groups could play a key role in delinquency prevention in these two spheres. But these groups are chronically lacking in resources. In Scotland alone, over 1000 jobs have been lost in the voluntary sector in the last year.

Jack Straw, the shadow home secretary, in the manifesto, Tackling Youth Crime. praises community involvement and calls for partnerships between local groups and local authorities. But he puts forward no strategy for financing local action. So let me make a proposal.

The next government should set up a National Neighbourhood Fund which will distribute resources to about 250 boards elected from the most socially deprived areas. These boards should then make grants to locally controlled groups for two particular purposes.

One, to extend youth work. It is worth mentioning that a survey in Easterhouse found over 80% of residents saying that the area's greatest priority was youth amenities. Extensive youth provision would give younger teenagers an alternative to delinquency and, as described, lay the foundations for later relationships with "resourceful friends".

Second, to create full time jobs, not just in youth work but also in credit unions, food, co-ops, day care centres and so on. Jobs with a purpose for young people would break the futility that leads to drug abuse, would attack the boredom and hopelessness that can lead to crime. Easterhouse has several hundred well-paid jobs - to social workers, welfare and medical staff. But most do not live in the area so the money is spent elsewhere. Jobs for local people would mean salaries spent in deprived areas which, in turn, would boost the local economy and so improve the quality of life for all.

£2 million pounds a year for each board would total &500 million in all. This is not a large amount and I believe it should come from central taxation. No doubt politicians will say the country cannot afford it although oddly it can afford increases in MP's salaries, can afford a £6.9 billion sweetener for the privatisation of the nuclear industry. So I come up with another suggestion. The centrally appointed lottery quangos should be replaced by the 250 elected boards who would distribute lottery money to the same ends.

This would enhance democracy, participation and re-distribution, These are values and practices which would specifically lead to less delinquency and would generally lead to a more just and, dare I say it, a more Christian society.

REFERENCES

J. Bowlby, Child Care and the Growth of Love, Pelican, 1953

M. Cockett & J. Tripp, The Exeter Family Study, Exeter University Press, 1994

N. Dennis & G. Erdos, Families without Fatherhood, IEA, 1993

J. Gibbons, et.al., Family Support and Prevention, HMSO, 1990

J. Graham & B. Bowling, Young People and Crime, Home Office, 1995

B. Holman, A New Deal for Social Welfare, Lion Publishing, 1993

B. Holman, The Evacuation. A Very British Revolution, Lion Publishing, 1995

I. Kolvin, et.al., Continuities of Deprivation, Avebury, 1991

C. Murray, The Emerging British Underclass, IEA, 1990

C. Petrie, The Nowhere Boys, Saxon House, 1980

K. Pringle, The Needs of Children, Hutchinson, 175

J. Straw & A. Michael, Tackling Youth Crime, Labour Party, 1996

D. Utting, et.al., Crime and the Family, Family Policy Studies Centre, 1993

M. Wadsworth, The Roots of Delinquency, Martin Robertson, 1979

D. West & D. Farrington, The Delinquent Way of Life, Heinemann, 1977

H. Wilson & G. Herbert, Parents and Children in the Inner City, Routledge, 1978