Offender Management Bill

I, too, support this probing amendment. Quite a number of us in the Chamber do not think young offenders should be in prison—there should be separate and different facilities for them. Another point to be taken into account is the enormous percentage of crimes that have taken place as a result of the churn of young people coming out of prisons or other establishment and going straight back in. As my noble friend Lady Stern said, peer pressure may have something to do with that. But there is surely a counter to that which, during this period of total overcrowding of prisons, can hardly begin to get off the ground—we all know that whether we acknowledge it or not. With a degree of partnership between everyone involved in this whole sphere, much more attention could be paid to deterring the young from getting on that cycle of reoffending. I know that everybody knows that point and supports it, but nothing like enough facilities go towards achieving it. It is obviously an area where the voluntary, statutory and employing sectors couldall get involved to help provide the training, accommodation and positive support so that the maximum number do not go back on the churn. I hope that rather more consideration will be given to this issue. I would be reassured to hear the Minister give us a more positive idea of how they are tackling this group so that these considerations do not have to be made at such an inappropriate moment. Young people should be treated separately and vulnerable young people up to the age of 21 are particularly in need of our help. As we all know—we have discussed it before—a huge proportion of them come from families where offending has been happening for generations. We used to call that the cycle of deprivation: I forget what it is currently called, but it amounts to the same thing. I hope that we will have a full account of what the Minister has in mind.