So it turns out that boot camps don't really work that well.
The Nats like the idea of putting kids in uniform and having people yell at them. Give 'em a kick up the bum and a bit of discipline, eh?
The Right wants boot camps to work, because if they do that would prove that people who commit crimes are not themselves victims of circumstances, but are instead personally weak. It would only be a short jump to concluding that people on welfare, or with addiction problems, just need to get off their arses.
If that were true we could slash spending on social programmes, rehabilitation and welfare, and everyone (well not everyone, obviously - just those who earn more) could pay less tax. And we'd be doing these miserable people a favour, right? Cruel to be kind, tough love, etc.
But boot camps don't seem to work for most kids.
Why would yanking someone out of a problem environment, yelling at them for a few weeks, then throwing them back where they came from, work? Okay, so boot camps are a bit more sophisticated than that, but you can't impose structure and discipline on a disordered and troubled person in a few weeks. Many kids from broken homes, where most of the boot camp candidates come from, are struggling to deal with enormous psychological problems, or have been abused.
When National's plan for boot camps was announced the experts said they wouldn't work.
They are not working. Which means that we can expect the usual response to a law and order measure that isn't working: it will work. Just give us more time. We need more camps. Repeat cycle until message thoroughly absorbed.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
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In fairness, it's a question of what their risk was when they went in, what their offence was and whether the subsequent on was more or less serious. (For properly high-risk offenders an equal or lower level of reoffending is cause for approval.)
ReplyDeleteI have an OIA dated November when they hadn't signed off on a monitoring or evaluation framework, so I'm not sure that will be possible to answer.
Also noting that it's 50-ish% for those that finished last year, which makes it quite a bit less than a year after finishing the course. People seem to normally use two years as the yardstick.
I think the PM's best point was (assisted paraphrase) If we knew for a fact all these people we going to prison-or-equivalent, and it's maybe no worse than that, at least it's cheaper.
If we are going to do anything with problem youth, let's put a free school lunch program in every school of decile five and below.
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