When Joaquim Clavaguera took
over as the Director of Criminal Law Enforcement and Youth Justice in the
Ministry of Justice of Catalonia, juvenile detention centres in Catalonia were
used as models in several other places. However, the new director felt that
many things were not working properly. “The recidivism rate is very high, and
that cannot continue”, he said. “We are held up as a model, but unfortunately
50% is still too high, even if it is the lowest rate. We cannot be self-satisfied
or complacent”.

For this reason, Clavaguera
decided to review the budget he had to work with in order to better prioritize.
“It doesn’t make any sense to me to invest in expensive renovations when what
we really need is to spend more money on educators”, he said. This led him to
the controversial decision, announced just hours before the talk, to close two
juvenile detention centres and reassign the young offenders affected to other
centres. “This isn’t about overcrowding”, he said. “It’s about saving money,
while at the same time trying to make things easier for the family members”.

Clavaguera placed particular
emphasis on how young people start out by committing minor offences that eventually
escalate into more serious ones. “They are given little slaps on the wrist”, he
said, “which they essentially ignore until it is too late and they must be
locked up. The problem needs to be nipped in the bud”.

Finally, Director Clavaguera talked about the situation of many
professionals working at detention centres. “They know perfectly well if a
young person can be helped or not”, he said. "There are some cases which,
whether we like it or not, are lost causes".