Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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361. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the bail supports in place for persons under 18 years of age who are released on bail. [18416/17]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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A key commitment to develop a Bail Supervision Scheme was part of the Youth Justice Action Plan 2014-2018, and in accordance with this commitment, a Bail Supervision Scheme (BSS) is currently operating on a two-year pilot basis covering the Dublin Children Court. The Scheme provides therapeutic supports in the community for children who are subject to bail conditions. Extern have been contracted to operate the scheme by providing a ‘wraparound’ service to the young person and their family with a prescribed reporting system back to the courts through the appropriate statutory bodies; Probation Service, An Garda Síochána and Oberstown. The scheme offers greater options to the courts in the knowledge that close monitoring will take place through interaction with the young people, their families and communities. It works with young people aged 12-17 years old who have initially been denied bail and remanded in detention. A Multisystemic Therapy [MST] treatment model is used to support the young person and their parent/caregivers to increase compliance with bail conditions if the young person is released from detention back into the community. MST is a family and community based treatment programme that addresses the multiple determinants of serious antisocial behaviour in young offenders. It empowers parents and caregivers to support their child to make positive changes across the individual, home, community, peer and school systems. Each family is assigned an MST therapist who will work intensively with them, including multiple contacts with family and other participants every week and ‘On Call’ support available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Treatment lasts between three and five months with the overarching goals of the Bail Supervision Scheme to support the young person to be at home, in education/training/employment and constructively engaged.

The Scheme aims to reduce the number of young people on remand in detention. On conclusion of the pilot phase of the Scheme, a formal review will be undertaken with the intention thereafter of putting in place a managed roll out of the Scheme nationwide.

To date the scheme has worked with 11 young people and their families. The level of support offered is very high with sessions taking place both in the family home and in the community. The number of missed or cancelled therapy sessions has been minimal and the re-engagement in education/training programmes in particular has been high, especially given that the young people concerned had been out of education for a long period of time.

The normal rules around breaches of conditions of bail are observed. Based on international evidence, this scheme should impact remand trends by offering the court the option of‘bail with supervision’ (as an alternative to a remand to detention).