‘Rossie saves lives’: behind the scenes at one of Scotland’s secure care centres

Peter Ranscombe visits Rossie Young People’s Trust near Montrose, which provides secure care and residential care for young people up to the age of 18.

Kevin Northcott is a man on a mission: as chief executive of Rossie Young People’s Trust, he’s forging closer links between his local community in Angus and an institution that was once known as ‘the bad boys’ school on the hill’.

What drives his mission comes down to one simple fact: “Rossie saves lives,” he says firmly. “I know that because it’s what the young people have told us, again and again.”

Sitting on a hill above Montrose, Rossie provides both secure care and residential care for boys and girls up to the age of 18, due to rise to 19 next April. Until the Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Act 2024, young people were referred to its secure care through Children’s Hearings; now, it also receives 16- and 17-year-olds on remand or who have been sentenced. Its residential care mainly receives referrals from local council social service units.

The facility has secure spaces for 26 young people and eight residential spaces. Rossie is the Scottish Government’s ‘national contingency resource’, meaning it will always have beds available in emergencies. Before the 2024 Act, some 60-70% of Rossie’s young people came from south of the Border, but now that ratio has flipped.

Formally, Rossie is registered as a charity, licensed by Scottish ministers and regulated by the Care Inspectorate, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education in Scotland and the Scottish Social Services Council. Its board of governors is chaired by retired senior civil servant Eddie Frizzell, a former chief executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS). In 2007, he led the Scottish Government’s inquiry into abuse at Kerelaw’s former residential school and secure unit in Ayrshire, which resulted in recommendations to prevent similar abuse in the care system.

‘I feel like a different person now’

Rossie is one of four independent charities that provide Scotland’s 74 secure care beds for young people, alongside the Good Shepherd Centre in Bishopton, the Kibble Safe Centre in Paisley and St Mary’s Kenmure in Bishopbriggs. Spread across 157 acres and surrounded by farms and woods, Rossie employs around 200 people, making it the largest employer in Angus outwith the local council.

Yet the facts and figures only tell part of Rossie’s story. The relationships built between the young people and the centre’s staff demonstrate Rossie’s real impact.

“Christmas is one of the busiest days of the year on the phones,” Kevin explains. “We have people who left Rossie years ago still calling to ask if individual members of staff are still here so they can thank them. It’s the same when staff know that a young person is leaving – they come in on their days off to say goodbye.”

The importance of the staff is echoed by the young people. “Building good relationships with all the staff is the best thing because I didn’t really have that before,” says ‘RM’, one of the young people currently staying at Rossie. “I feel more confident because of it and have got to try lots of different new things and had lots of opportunities that I would have never had before. I feel like a different person now than when I came here in September, which is really good.”

Those “new things” available for the young people to try range from a gym, Astroturf pitch and swimming pool through to a multimedia room with computer games that can double-up as a music studio.

Giving young people structure and confidence

Yet perhaps the biggest impact on the lives of Rossie’s young people – many of whom have faced abuse or other traumas – doesn’t come through the facilities, but through what so many youngsters take for granted: a stable routine and access to education. “A typical day at Rossie gives me structure, which is really good to follow,” explains RM. “I want to follow the same routine when I leave Rossie to go home because I feel so much better now.”

That routine includes lessons at Rossie’s two schools, one for secure care and one for residential care. Alongside traditional subjects – ranging from English and maths through to art and home economics – the centre also provides ‘through care’, which helps young people to gain wider skills for life, such as learning to drive, opening bank accounts and applying for housing.

In August this year, Rossie will open a skills academy in partnership with Dundee & Angus College, through which its young people will be able to learn vocational skills, such as plumbing, joinery and painting and decorating. Kevin is especially excited about the bike maintenance course, which will allow Rossie to open a ‘bike library’, through which local families can borrow bikes and swap them when their children need bigger sizes.

Forging deeper links with the local community is already paying dividends. After a visit from members of Dundee & Angus Chamber of Commerce, local employers are offering training opportunities.

Another new facility within the grounds is helping to forge closer links within families. Coorie House provides activities and a playground for residents to meet their siblings, offering an alternative to the traditional fleeting meetings at McDonald’s or KFC.

Before the pandemic, volunteers from Edinburgh-based law firm Gillespie Macandrew helped build the site’s therapeutic garden. “There’s a real legacy around what they achieved,” Kevin explains.

Moving from secure care to prison

Kevin qualified as a teacher and worked in the SPS for a decade. “When I left the prison service, I promised myself I wouldn’t work in another job where I was carrying around so many keys,” he says with a wry smile, as he unlocks yet another door during a tour of one of Rossie’s schools.

Kevin’s big ring of keys highlights the difference between the two parts of Rossie: the secure estate, in which locked doors deprive young people of their liberty; and the residential parts, where young people can begin living independently. Following intense psychological work, young people in the secure estate can also spend time in the wider community, following risk assessments.

Rossie’s courses are coordinated with Polmont prison, so young people serving sentences can continue with their education or vocational training. Rather than visit the prison before being transferred – which can carry a stigma of ‘showing weakness’ among prisoners – young people can use virtual reality headsets to take tours, helping to ease any anxiety.

While most young people don’t spend long enough at Rossie to begin the restorative justice process of engaging with the victims of their crimes – a typical stay in secure care is between six and nine months – that work does begin if they’re at the centre for longer.

Technology has transformed the bedrooms, with radar used to monitor young people’s movements and sleep – helping to keep them and staff members safe – and touchscreens on the walls, like giant encased iPads, allowing residents to be connected to relatives or to play games with staff. “I was sceptical because I thought they would get broken – but we tested one with a sledgehammer and they’re pretty indestructible,” admits Kevin.

Less hi-tech improvements include bedroom windows that open, thanks to metal mesh, providing fresh air to aid sleep. It also means there are no longer bars on the bedroom windows – helping Rossie to shed that cliché as ‘the bad boys’ school on the hill’.