Restrictive physical interventions involving young people in custody
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1. Main facts and figures
- in 2017/18, there was a lower rate of restrictive physical interventions (where a young person’s movement or mobility is restricted) among White young people in custody compared with young people from all other ethnic groups combined
- in 7 out of 8 years between 2010/11 and 2017/18, the rate of restrictive physical interventions for White young people was lower than for young people from all other ethnic groups combined
- in 2017/18, the rate of restrictive physical interventions in both the White and Other ethnic groups reached its highest point in the 8 years covered by this data
Things you need to know
The circumstances are different for each restrictive physical intervention. You should avoid simple conclusions or direct comparisons between ethnicities or institutions.
The data counts every restrictive physical intervention. Some young people may be involved in repeated interventions, in which case they will be included in the data more than once. This means that the rates per 100 young people should be considered with some caution.
The data does not include young people in custody whose ethnicity wasn’t known.
What the data measures
This data measures the average number of ‘restrictive physical interventions’ per 100 young people in custody per month in each year covered (the ‘rate’).
A restrictive physical intervention is the use of force on a young person in custody, with the aim of restricting their movement or mobility.
The data includes young people being held in:
- young offender institutions
- secure children’s homes
- secure training centres
'Young people’ are 10 to 17 years old. The data may also include some 18 year olds.
For each financial year covered, the data in the table shows the:
- average number of restrictive physical interventions in custody per month
- average rate of restrictive physical interventions per 100 young people in custody per month
If a young person has multiple restrictive physical interventions, each one is counted as a separate incident.
The ethnic categories used in this data
The number of young people involved in restrictive physical interventions was too small to make reliable generalisations about specific ethnic categories.
Therefore, the data is broken down into the following 2 broad categories:
- White – White ethnic groups (including White British and White ethnic minorities)
- Other – all other ethnic minorities
2. By ethnicity
| White | Other than White | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Time | White Rate per 100 young people per month | White Average number per month | Other than White Rate per 100 young people per month | Other than White Average number per month |
| 2010/11 | 19.1 | 364.6 | 23.8 | 231.3 |
| 2011/12 | 22.5 | 387.9 | 30.0 | 312.3 |
| 2012/13 | 23.5 | 324.6 | 24.8 | 213.1 |
| 2013/14 | 29.1 | 298.3 | 28.2 | 176.9 |
| 2014/15 | 25.8 | 223.7 | 32.6 | 179.2 |
| 2015/16 | 25.0 | 192.8 | 32.0 | 168.2 |
| 2016/17 | 29.8 | 194.8 | 35.8 | 182.3 |
| 2017/18 | 37.0 | 243.1 | 39.4 | 207.4 |
Download table data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV)
Summary of Restrictive physical interventions involving young people in custody By ethnicity Summary
A restrictive physical intervention is the use of force on a young person in custody, with the aim of restricting their movement or mobility.
This data shows that:
- in 2017/18, there was an average of 37.0 restrictive physical interventions per 100 White young people in custody per month, and 39.4 per 100 people per month for young people from all other ethnic groups combined
- in 7 out of 8 years between 2010/11 and 2017/18, the rate of restrictive physical interventions for White young people was lower than for young people from all other ethnic groups combined
- between 2010/11 and 2017/18, the rate of restrictive physical interventions among White young people increased from 19.1 to 37.0 per 100 people (the highest rate in 8 years)
- in the same period, the rate among young people from all other ethnic groups combined increased from 23.8 to 39.4 per 100 people (again, the highest rate in 8 years)
3. Methodology
Young people report their own ethnicity. Staff working in secure training centres and young offender institutions then record this information.
The numbers of young people in custody are counted at the beginning of each month. They are updated to include new admissions during the month, and then averaged across a 12-month period.
Rounding
Percentages have been rounded to 1 decimal point. Due to this, some figures may not add up to 100. Counts have been rounded to the nearest whole number. All calculations have been made using unrounded figures.
See the Youth justice statistics for 2017/18 for unrounded figures and the percentages calculated from them.
Related publications
Quality and methodology information
Further technical information
Figures published before the release of the 2017/18 youth justice statistics may have been revised since their original publication.
4. Data sources
Source
Youth Justice statistics: 2017 to 2018
Type of data
Administrative data
Type of statistic
National Statistics
Publisher
Ministry of Justice
Publication frequency
Yearly
Purpose of data source
The data is used by the government to develop, monitor and evaluate criminal justice policy for young offenders in England and Wales.