New figures suggest Kent Police and our courts are dealing with more young offenders than ever before.

But a Kent criminologist says we are not catching more criminals, we are just “making more”.

In the county there has been a 44 per cent increase in cautions and a 17 per cent rise in convictions of 10- to 18-year-olds since 2002 - according to think-tank the Institute of Public Policy Research.

It says we need community panels to deal with children instead of the prison service.

University of Kent criminologist Mike Presdee agrees this is not the way forward.

He said: “I’m afraid the answer has to lie somewhere else, because locking up young people is not the way out. It takes them deeper into the criminal culture and in the end what you are doing you are making criminals and not taking them out and trying to show them another way.”