Peer-on-peer abuse and exploitation: the role of youth offending services in building a local response

Youth offending services throughout England and Wales are at the forefront of working with and supporting young people who have been abused by, and/or who abuse, their peers. This briefing paper highlights the role of youth offending services in building responses to peer-on-peer abuse, and is the third in the series published by the MsUnderstood Partnership1 (MSU) to assist the development of local practice. Following briefings on the nature of peer-on-peer abuse and ways to audit local practices, this document draws upon work underway in the eleven MSU sites, in addition to wider research, to explore: a) approaches being taken by youth offending services around the country to map and intervene with peer networks affected by peer-on-peer abuse b) ways in which the new assessment tool ‘AssetPlus’ can assist in the identification of young people affected by peer-on-peer abuse c) how intervention plans can adopt a contextual approach to safeguarding young people from peer-on-peer abuse