Welcome

Youth Justice - Measuring Compliance with International Standards

Download Final Programme (pdf)

The Centre for Criminal Justice and Human Rights at the Faculty of Law, University College Cork is delighted to host this international conference on Youth Justice in association with the Children Acts Advisory Board.

The Conference is a two-day event – Thursday April 3^rd and Friday 4^th 2008 - designed to bring together a range of people from around the world who work in the field of youth justice as researchers, practitioners or policy makers.

For full details of the Conference Programme and how to Register see the menus on the left.

The objectives of the Conference are to:

• Share knowledge about the experiences of other jurisdictions in the area of youth justice;
• Identify the prevalent trends with respect to the treatment of young offenders and what effectively addresses youth crime and its underlying causes;
• Assess the extent to which youth justice law and practice compiles with international standards on children’s rights;
• Identify the priority areas for reform.

Issues that will be addressed at the Conference include the compliance with international children’s rights standards of issues including:

• The age of criminal responsibility;
• The trial of children and young people;
• The relationship between the police and young people in conflict with the law;
• The diversion of young people away from the criminal justice system to the health and social services or police-led diversion programmes;
• The use of community sanctions, including restorative justice, to children convicted of criminal offences;
• The use of detention for young people, and the conditions in which they are detained.

A range of jurisdictions will be represented at the conference including

• Ireland
• England and Wales
• Northern Ireland
• Scotland
• Finland
• The Netherlands
• Australia
• New Zealand
• The United States of America
• Canada
• Pakistan
• India.

The Programme is comprised of plenary papers from invited experts and parallel sessions from researchers and practitioners from around the world. The conference will also be addressed by the (Irish) Ombudsman for Children and the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Mr Thomas Hammarberg.

Select papers from the conference will be published in a Special Edition of Youth Justice an International Journal edited by Ursula Kilkelly in 2008.