Responsibility and Rights: Children and Their Parents in the Youth Justice System

Responsibility is one of the key themes to emerge from the reformsto the youth justice system that have taken place since 1998.Now, the child and his parents are responsible for the offendingbehaviour of the child. This article explores the nature ofchild and parental responsibility in the youth justice system.In particular it analyses the type of responsibility demandedof both child and parent, drawing on the work of Hart and Caneto provide a conceptual analysis of responsibility in youthjustice. It goes on to consider the impact on the rights ofthe child and his parent of the mechanisms used to require responsibilityfrom parents for their child's offending (such as parentingorders, bind-overs, and the payment of fines and compensation).It suggests that there has been a lack of conceptual clarityin government policy and that if the current scheme for demandingparental responsibility continues then better attention needsto be paid to the rights of both parent and child.