New Youth Guidance Office set up to reduce trend of youth offences - CNA - 3 Aug 2010

SINGAPORE: A new central Youth Guidance Office has been set up to address the issue of youth offenders.


Announcing this at the Home Affairs Ministry's National Day Observance Ceremony on Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng said the office will coordinate different programmes run by the government and community partners.

Mr Wong said this was a key recommendation of an Inter-Ministry Committee set up last year to address the challenge of preventing youths from offending and re-offending.

The Home Affairs Ministry said Singapore has one of the lowest re-offending rates in the world, and there has been good progress to lower school attrition rates and reduce the spate of re-offending.

However, there is still the need to intervene early before students drop out of school, become youth offenders and subsequently develop a criminal lifestyle.

The Deputy Prime Minister explained that enforcement is only one part of the long term solution to bring down Singapore's crime rates to a low level. He said the enforcement agencies must also ensure that the trend of re-offending is closely monitored.

So the new Central Youth Guidance Office, under the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports, will look into early intervention strategies to prevent youth-at-risk from committing crimes.

Mr Wong said: "Breaking the cycle of offending and re-offending early can help to prevent the situation of a growing social underclass and increasing numbers trapped at the margins of society over time.

"If left unaddressed, the social costs can be high. The repeated imprisonment not only alienates the offender from society, it also puts his family and children in a crisis and raises the risk of inter-generational crime."

Mr Wong said the Education Ministry has several initiatives to keep children in school engaged in their studies and it will continue refining the system.

In the pipeline is a befriender service for inmates, where volunteers take part in a mentoring relationship that begins in prison and continues after their release.

Mr Wong said: "We recognise that for offenders, the real life challenges and temptations to re-offend happen when they are released from the controlled prison environment.

"Hence, community support networks for offenders, such as peer support, family and professional aftercare support will need to be strengthened to prevent re-offending."

The Singapore Aftercare Association will be co-ordinating this programme and will provide training for the volunteer be-frienders.

Grassroots organisations will also be encouraged to provide support for families of offenders in their neighbourhood.

One such programme already available is the We Care @ Admiralty pioneered by MP for the area, Maliki Osman. Several more will be modelled along the lines of the Admiralty division's programme.

The Home Affairs Ministry's National Day celebrations also saw several awards being given out.

Among them was a special award to the Religious Rehabilitation Group (RRG) for its efforts to help counter the threat of extremist ideology.

Co-chairman of RRG, Ustaz Ali, said: "Our belief is - we are doing the right way to protect our religion and also our country. So this is a small role that we are playing to safeguard our country and people of Singapore, and to meet with all those who are radicals.

"Radicalisation should be cured and remedied. So the rehabilitation we are doing is (to) try to remedy them and bring them to the right path and bring them to be as Singaporean."

The Inter Agency Aftercare Group, which represented the Association of Muslim Professionals, Khadijah Mosque Management Board, Taman Bacaan and Mendaki, were also commended for their efforts to provide holistic aftercare programmes to help counter the threat of extremist terrorism.

Singapore's Casino Regulatory Authority was also awarded the "Minister for Home Affairs National Day Award" for leadership and excellence in developing and operationalising a comprehensive regime for regulating the casino industry in Singapore.

Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1073003/1/.html