YOIs & Remand

Know this in 60 seconds

→ A YOI is a secure place for children under 18. Most children in custody are 15 to 17. Under 18s are not sent to adult prisons.

→ Custody is meant to be a last resort. A court can send you there on remand while your case is still going on, or as a sentence once your case is decided.

→ Remand is a big part of it. About 44% of children in custody are on remand, and 62% of children remanded to youth detention did not then get a custodial sentence.

→ Custody can be unsafe. In an official survey, 43% of children said they had felt unsafe at some point and 61% had experienced bullying, violence or victimisation from other children.

→ You still have rights inside: education, health care, family contact, an independent advocate and free legal advice.

What a YOI is

If you are under 18 and a court sends you to custody, you go to a secure place for children, not an adult prison.

There are four types: young offender institutions (YOIs), a secure training centre, secure children's homes and a secure school. The Youth Custody Service decides where each child goes.

In the year to March 2025, there were about 420 children in custody at any one time, the lowest number on record. 96% were aged 15 to 17, and 63% were held in YOIs. A YOI holds children in units of 30 to 60. Secure children's homes and secure training centres are smaller.

The average custodial sentence for a child in that year was 18.8 months.

Remand: held before your case is decided

Remand means a court decides you should be held in custody until your next court date, before it has decided whether you are guilty. You are not sentenced. You can be on remand for weeks or months, and a child on remand stays until their next court date.

In the year to March 2025, remand made up 44% of the children in custody. Of the children remanded to youth detention, 62% did not then receive a custodial sentence. Some were found not guilty or had their cases dropped. The Youth Justice Board has also reported that court delays hit a record high, with an average of 230 days from offence to the case ending. It said remand is meant to be a last resort but is too often used to manage pressure on the system.

This matters because even a short time on remand can mean missed school, lost work and time away from family, before anything has been decided.

Life inside: safety, bullying and violence

HM Inspectorate of Prisons asked 12 to 18 year olds in YOIs and secure training centres about their experience in 2024 to 2025. 43% said they had felt unsafe at some point. 61% said they had experienced some form of bullying, violence or victimisation from other children. Only 27% said they would report it. Children with a disability were more likely to have felt unsafe.

The official safety figures show the same pattern. In October to December 2025 there were 489 assaults in the children's secure estate, 24 of them serious, and 400 incidents of self-harm. Compared with the same period a year earlier, the rate of assaults was up 6% and the rate of self-harm was up 32%.

When children are not safe, staff can keep them apart or separate them. The inspectors found that some children stayed in their cells because they were scared. Time out of cell also varies a lot. On weekdays, 61% of children said they got two hours or more out of cell, but that ranged from 33% to 97% depending on the place.

If you are scared or being hurt, tell a member of staff, an independent advocate or a trusted adult. You are allowed to ask for help.

Your brain and your future

The courts in England and Wales are told that children and young people are still developing. The Sentencing Council, which writes the rules for sentencing, says children are not fully developed and may not fully understand how their actions affect other people. It says emotional and developmental age matters at least as much as age in years, and that a custodial sentence for a child should always be a last resort.

It also says young adults, typically aged 18 to 25, are still developing neurologically. They may be less able to weigh up the results of their actions, hold back impulses and limit risk-taking. Its guidance adds that an immature young person may find it particularly hard to cope with custody.

That is why custody is meant to be a last resort for young people. These are the years when people are still learning to make decisions and build the skills for work, so time away from school, family and training matters. Everyone is different. Custody is meant to provide education, health care and support, and some young people use them well.

How long a conviction has to be shared with employers depends on the sentence. Ask your youth justice worker or solicitor what applies to you.

Who ends up in custody

Black children are over-represented in youth custody in England and Wales. In the year to March 2025 they made up 22% of children in custody and 28% of children held on remand. They are a much smaller share of all 10 to 17 year olds. Mixed-heritage children made up 18% of children in custody.

An official Youth Justice Board study looked at cases from October 2017 to December 2019. It found that 26.1% of Black children were remanded in custody, compared with 15.4% of White children. Part of that gap is explained by things like the offence and past record. But not all of it. Even after those were taken into account, Black children were still more likely to be remanded in custody or given a custodial sentence. The study says part of the gap could come from how risk is judged. It could not look at earlier steps such as arrests or charging decisions.

This is about how the system treats young people. It is not about who is more likely to offend. If you think you were treated unfairly because of your race, you can tell your solicitor or your youth justice worker.

Different views: when custody is needed

Not everyone agrees that custody should be rare. Some youth workers and others argue that for a small number of young people, a secure setting is the safest place for a time. That can be where a young person has seriously hurt someone, or is at serious risk of being hurt themselves. They also point out that victims and the public need protecting, and that custody can give structure, education and health care that some young people have never had.

The figures show it is a small number. Custody numbers are at their lowest on record, with about 420 children in custody at any one time. But serious offending has not gone away. In the year to March 2025, knife and offensive weapon offences by children rose 2%, and proven sexual offences rose 6% to about 1,500.

The other side of the argument is the evidence on this page: remand ends without a custodial sentence for most children who are held, and children in custody report bullying, violence and feeling unsafe. Whatever side you take, the same questions come up: is custody safe, is it fair, and does it lead somewhere?

Your rights in plain English

The government's Youth Justice Charter sets out what children in youth custody should expect.

→ Contact. A phone call within 2 hours of arriving. After you are sentenced, at least one visit every 2 weeks. On remand in a YOI, up to 3 visits a week. At least one letter a week, with free paper and stamps.

→ Education. At least 15 hours of education or training a week, usually including maths, English and IT.

→ Health care. A health team looks after your mental and physical health, and specialist support can be arranged for needs such as autism or ADHD.

→ Safety. Force should only be used after other ways of preventing harm have been tried. Afterwards you should be able to talk it through with a member of staff who was not involved.

→ Independent advice. You can ask for an advocate at any time. They do not work for the custody service. You also have the right to free legal advice.

→ Complaints. Tell the person named in the standard, or ask a trusted adult to. If that does not work, you can make a complaint. In a YOI, complaints go to the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman. You can also contact the Children's Commissioner.

This page is general information, not legal advice.