Offender Management Bill

My Lords, in the first instance, I said that legislative powers were available and that those powers were there for the courts and the police to use. Secondly, we are prepared to give leadership and guidance in this. I made two references to the value of bringing forward guidance, and I remind the right reverend Prelate, who I know is greatly experienced in the field, that we are committed to improving that guidance during the current year. I shall take up one of the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. He said that he had great difficulty and had to go to the Schizophrenia Society to find out how many diversion schemes there were. The number of schemes increased during the 1990s, when some £10 million of pump priming was provided by the Home Office. We have worked with NACRO, and the database that we have jointly put together currently shows 143 schemes. We can identify other schemes as a product of the Revolving Doors report of 2006. So there is clearly a large number of such schemes in operation, and I am sure that they are doing extremely valuable work. NACRO’s survey says that most of those schemes operate for four or five days a week. Fewer than 20 per cent operate across the spectrum of police station, court and prison, but almost 50 per cent had some joint funding arrangements in place, usually with social services. Some are provided by the voluntary sector. So there is a lot of data there and a lot more information that I am sure can be taken from the NACRO survey. That shows that progress has been made; it shows also that there is much more to be done. It is important that we persist in developing this. We are trying to ensure that the schemes work without the need for recourse to a centralist, rather bureaucratic framework. We want to encourage them through the adoption of best practice and effective guidance, as I just said to the right reverend Prelate. I think that I have covered all the other points that were raised during the discussion. In conclusion, I tell the noble Lord that I understand the spirit behind the amendment. Clearly, we are going in the right direction. Much good work is being undertaken; the survey demonstrates that. More be done, more can be achieved. I certainly see the need for it to develop, but we think that the legislative straitjacket that the noble Lord suggests in his amendment is unnecessary and may inhibit the development of good quality schemes. For those reasons, I urge him to withdraw the amendment, but I have found this a useful debate, and the points made have been very valuable to us.