Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

moved Amendment No. 1: 1: Before Clause 1, insert the following new Clause— ““PART A1 Principles Principles of the youth justice system (1) Section 37 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 (c. 37) (aim of the youth justice system) is amended as follows. (2) Before subsection (1) insert— ““(A1) The youth justice system shall ensure that it carries out its functions in accordance with the following principles— (a) the best interests of the child shall be the paramount consideration, (b) arrest and deprivation of liberty of a child shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest possible time, and (c) the child shall at all times be treated with humanity and respect for his or her inherent human dignity.”””” The noble Baroness said: The amendment arises from a concern that in the part of the Bill dealing with youth justice we shall find ourselves dealing with technicalities and will not have an opportunity to ask the Government some basic questions which will help us later on. For example, where do these proposed changes fit in? What is their contribution to the Government’s vision of the system? Indeed, what is the Government’s vision of the system? How is it evolving as the joint unit between the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Children, Schools and Families develops? This amendment sets out a statement of principles to go at the beginning of the Bill, which would make it clear to all those working in the system what they were supposed to be doing, and how the Government propose to hold them accountable for compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which the Government are a signatory and which Ministers have, therefore, committed themselves to upholding. I am very grateful to the Standing Committee on Youth Justice for the excellent work that it has done on the Bill and for its support for noble Lords in preparing background material. For various reasons, we have seen in the past few years a drift away from the basic principles that should govern a youth justice system and that are the reason why we have a distinctive system which is not the same as the system for adults. Children are not adults; they are still developing and still very vulnerable. It is undeniable that our youth justice system has gradually moved in a direction that takes it a very long way from the mainstream of systems in comparable countries. I hope that recent developments, such as the involvement of the Department for Children, Schools and Families, will start a countervailing movement back to the norm. We have indeed gone a very long way from what is seen as normal in most countries. Our age of criminal responsibility is extraordinarily low. At a meeting chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, in this House on 24 January, we heard that in Denmark, Germany and Spain, the age of criminal responsibility is 15, 14 and 14, respectively. I must declare an interest as that meeting was arranged by the International Centre for Prison Studies at King’s College, where I have a position. The consequence of the practice elsewhere is that, for all children under those ages in those countries, the measures taken are covered not by criminal jurisdiction but by welfare law. Those countries have various types of government; the approaches are not related at all to Governments of one particular colour or ideology. They are the mainstream, normal way of dealing with children in trouble. I know that increasing the age of criminal responsibility would be difficult because it would be misunderstood as meaning that no action could be taken against children who are under that age, but that is completely wrong. I therefore hope that we shall in due course have a fruitful discussion on proposals to be made by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, to deal with children under 14, where appropriate, in the family court. We in England and Wales are also remarkably out of line in using custody for children, and particularly in using it as punitive custody rather than as custody for care and protection. We were all saddened last year to read the inquest verdicts on two boys who died in custody, one aged 14 and one aged 15. We know that in most similar jurisdictions they would not have been in a place of punitive custody, if they had been locked up at all. They would have been in a place akin to local authority secure accommodation that is part of the system of caring for children and they would not have died. We are out of line in using the criminal process to deal with myriad types of behaviour that are quite common among children and young people, behaviour which they grow out of or which can be dealt with more effectively in other ways. We are way out of line with other jurisdictions. We are also way out of line with our international human rights obligations. The basis of these obligations, and particularly of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, is that children should be protected from harm and given the chance to grow up into healthy adults who contribute to society. The Minister will be aware that last April the Committee on the Rights of the Child issued a general comment—a form of detailed guidance setting out what is expected of countries that have ratified the convention in their juvenile justice systems. The committee sets out its view that, "““a minimum age of criminal responsibility below the age of 12 years is considered … not to be internationally acceptable””." The committee also sets out part of what it means to make the best interests of the child the guiding principle. It says: "““The protection of the best interests of the child means, for instance, that the traditional objectives of criminal justice (repression/retribution) must give way to rehabilitation and restorative justice objectives in dealing with child offenders. This can be done in concert with attention to effective public safety””." I am eager to hear the Minister’s reply to the amendment, because I wonder on what grounds he will resist it. Will he oppose it because the Government wish to take actions that are against the best interests of the child? I doubt it very much. It is clear that making the best interests of the child paramount does not mean that we cannot pay regard to public safety. Clearly it is not in the best interests of a child to be violent to others or to make the lives of everyone in the neighbourhood a misery, but when we take action to stop that, surely we should take actions that help the child to grow up healthy and non-criminal. That is what ““in the best interests of the child”” means. Can the Minister really oppose having such a principle in the Bill? Secondly, should we not try to keep children out of the system, and out of custody, as far as possible? Would the Minister not agree with that, too? Thirdly, I cannot imagine that the Minister envisages any situation in which it would not be right to treat a child with humanity and respect for his or her human dignity. I look forward to debating the amendment, and I beg to move.