Debate contribution: CAMHS Pilot: Youth Justice Agency

Debate contribution by Mrs Naomi Long on 29 April 2025.

MLA: Mrs Naomi Long
Party at the time: Alliance Party
Date: 29 April 2025
Type: Debate contribution (made as a minister)
Business: Oral Answers to Questions
Heading: CAMHS Pilot: Youth Justice Agency
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 4922089

Text

I am delighted to say that the CAMHS partnership between the Youth Justice Agency and Health and Social Care has now been rolled out across Northern Ireland. I have been able to prioritise £155,000 from within the Department's budget to support it this year, with the rest coming from the Youth Justice Agency's budget and from Health and Social Care. Many children involved in offending behaviour struggle with their mental health. Due to their vulnerabilities and sometimes chaotic lives and family contexts, they also struggle to engage in a consistent way with mainstream child and adolescent mental health services. The new partnership with the Youth Justice Agency takes a different approach. Through assertive outreach, children are supported to receive the help that they require in a way that meets their needs, and that assists in reducing their offending behaviour. The results so far have been really encouraging, and we will be initiating an evaluation of the service later in the year.

161 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.02 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.69).
No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
Subject area: Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits.
The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.

This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.

Jev’s structured answers

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.02	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.02	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.01	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.02	No
Controversy escalation	0.02	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.69	Yes
Overall judgement	0.02	At or below not-flagging threshold

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	1.00
Reports or questions it	0.00
Criticises or condemns it	0.00
Adopts it	0.00

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits	0.87
No identity-related subject	0.10
Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups	0.03
Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials	0.00
Parades, bonfires and commemorations	0.00

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:28 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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