Children in youth custody, England and Wales
The average number of children under 18 in custody in the youth secure estate in England and Wales each year to March, from the Youth Justice Board's statistics.
Children under 18 in youth custody, average
418
2024/25 · year ending March 2025
Verified against source, 9 November 2026, 15:17 UTCSource: Youth Justice Board for England and Wales. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Data table
25 periods, newest first
| Period | Children under 18 in youth custody, average |
|---|---|
| 2024/25 | 418 |
| 2023/24 | 430 |
| 2022/23 | 441 |
| 2021/22 | 454 |
| 2020/21 | 560 |
| 2019/20 | 781 |
| 2018/19 | 859 |
| 2017/18 | 894 |
| 2016/17 | 868 |
| 2015/16 | 960 |
| 2014/15 | 1,037 |
| 2013/14 | 1,216 |
| 2012/13 | 1,544 |
| 2011/12 | 1,963 |
| 2010/11 | 2,040 |
| 2009/10 | 2,418 |
| 2008/09 | 2,881 |
| 2007/08 | 2,932 |
| 2006/07 | 2,915 |
| 2005/06 | 2,832 |
| 2004/05 | 2,746 |
| 2003/04 | 2,771 |
| 2002/03 | 3,052 |
| 2001/02 | 2,847 |
| 2000/01 | 2,807 |
Source and licence
- Publisher
- Youth Justice Board for England and Wales
- Check it yourself
- https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/youth-justice-statistics
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0 – Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Retrieved
- 9 November 2026, 15:01 UTC
- Raw files fetched
- https://www.gov.uk/api/content/government/statistics/youth-justice-statistics-2024-to-2025SHA-256 1802117d6d2ea7a5ab46491709e235a9e1ddc71da386d022dd297b93656acbc2 · 4,083 bytes
- https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6981c8d2e8900d4c455f3730/Youth_Justice_Statistics_2024_to_2025_supplementary_tables.zipSHA-256 70ca947f3105d32a5170068a58866370d6c84c8bdf906a586c25a79c45b191c0 · 158,524 bytes
Verification
Verified against source, 9 November 2026, 15:17 UTC Run at 9 November 2026, 15:17 UTC; 25 of 25 figures matched the live source.
| Result | Check | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | Provenance recorded | Youth Justice Board for England and Wales; Open Government Licence v3.0; retrieved 2026-11-09T15:01:33Z; 2 raw file(s) |
| Pass | Raw files match recorded SHA-256 | 2 of 2 files intact |
| Pass | Re-parsing raw files reproduces figures | 25 of 25 figures and the headline reproduced; the meta's accreditation match |
| Pass | Figures are finite numbers | 25 figures, 0 invalid |
| Pass | Live source matches every figure | 25 of 25 figures match exactly after downloading 2 source file(s) again (2 byte-identical); the headline matches; the meta's accreditation match |
| Pass | GOV.UK table is current | latest period 2024/25 ended 588 days before retrieval (limit 700), from Youth Justice Statistics: 2024 to 2025 supplementary tables |
| Pass | Table 7.1 gives Table 7.2's averages | 11 of 11 figures match Table 7.1 of the stored chapter, the years ending March it gives |
| Pass | The release's commentary agrees | https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/youth-justice-statistics-2024-to-2025/youth-justice-statistics-2024-to-2025 says just under 420 for 2024/25; the record gives 417.67 |
| Pass | Each year's average is its twelve months' | 25 of 25 cases of Table 7.2's years give an average monthly population that is the mean of its twelve months within 1e-06 (25 exactly) |
| Pass | Source page answers | https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/youth-justice-statistics – HTTP 200 |
Notes
- The average of the monthly counts of children aged 10 to 17 in custody in the youth secure estate (secure children's homes, secure training centres and young offender institutions) in England and Wales, over each year from April to March, as the Youth Justice Board publishes it. Those aged 18 and over held in the youth estate are left out. Shown to the whole child; the published figures, with their decimals, are in the record's JSON.
- The Youth Justice Board for England and Wales publishes these as accredited official statistics.