On the occasion of the graduation of the last course of the U-Turn program the Government wishes to acknowledge the efforts of Mission Australia and the program staff in assisting many young people to turn their lives around over the past 12 years.
The Government has previously announced that a revised intervention model will be implemented for young people aged 18- 25 years with guaranteed funding of $500,000 per year over the forward estimates for this purpose.
This decision was taken because on coming to Government we became aware of an evaluation undertaken by the Department of Police and Emergency Management, which showed that U-Turn has not been working as well as it should be and in some cases may actually have been counter-productive.
On receiving that advice the only responsible thing to do was to continue our funding commitment and redesign the program to provide better outcomes for participants.
We are working closely with stakeholders, including Mission Australia and UTAS on the redesigned program.
It is anticipated that the new intervention model will be finalised shortly with a tender for program delivery to be released within the next 2 months.
We also have a range of initiatives to assist younger offenders and break the cycle of youth crime. The Liberal Government committed $3.3 million over three years to these programs, which include Save the Children's Supporting Young People on Bail program and Post-Detention Transition program, and support for Tasmania’s PCYC network to improve relationships between Police and young people and help divert young people from anti-social or criminal behaviour.