Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

I wholeheartedly support Amendment No. 5 and agree with the points just raised by the noble Lord, Lord Judd. I shall also to Amendment No. 6, which stands in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Falkner. It is a sad reflection on the reality of our management of children who are currently in trouble and offending that these amendments are necessary at all. The amendments are designed to ensure that custody is used only as a last resort for children—when in theory, of course, there is already a requirement that it be the last resort for offenders of all ages except the most dangerous and prolific. We know that that is not the case for adults. Shockingly, it is not true in the case of children either. In the past 10 years, children have increasingly been sent to custody not only for lesser offences but for longer periods, thus violating Article 37(b) of the CRC. The reality is that the number of children in custody has more than doubled in 15 years, increasing by 110 per cent, so that approximately 3,000 are now in custody. The number of children under 15 in custody has increased by more than 700 per cent. I wish that the noble Lord on the Tory Front Bench would listen; these are terribly important points. The number of children under 15 in custody has increased from 100 to over 800. The numbers are staggering, even more so when one considers that the number of indictable offences has actually decreased by 20 per cent over the same period, that clear-up rates have been stable since 1995 and that 42 per cent fewer people report being victims of crime. That is crucial evidence on the extent to which we are criminalising our young people today. I believe that it is a disaster for our society and our young people. We know beyond peradventure that custody does virtually nothing to prevent reoffending, as more than 80 per cent of very young offenders 15 and under reoffend. Moreover, as has just been discussed, the experience of custody, the removal from home, the disruption of lives and the inevitable alienation of our younger generation, who represent our tomorrow, all of those actually promote criminal behaviour. We already know that these young people represent the most damaged and vulnerable in our society, for whom treatment and help is desperately needed. However, I fear that we have said this so often that it is becoming a platitude and no one listens to it any more. I am in no way trying to justify or minimise the crimes that young people can and do commit. They can be awful, even disgusting. But let us remember the evidence: offending has been stable; it is custody that has gone up. Furthermore, as we will hear over and over again, where children are concerned the CRC rightly insists that the welfare of the child is paramount, that his need as well as his deed must be of central consideration and that he is not, therefore, to be treated as a small adult. I am aware that we are developing a culture in our society in which the young are increasingly disliked, even feared. This is being reflected in our legislation. ASBOs, to which the noble Lord, Lord Judd, referred, are born of this. I am also aware how much Ministers dislike international comparisons, but the fact is that, of every 100,000 under 18, we lock up 23—I think that this has already been mentioned—while in France the figure is six.