Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

I am happy to respond to the noble Lord. I thought I was being consistent and that my remarks dealt with both facets. It is certainly so that my colleagues in another place emphasised the issue of public interest and confidence in what we are seeking to do here. That is because we have made a great deal of progress in our discussions in the past two days about the importance of developing community sentences to ensure that custody is the last option. Those community sentences should be effective and should aid the prevention of reoffending. There is little that I have seen that we disagree about. But we also believe that in terms of public confidence we have to show that community sentences are not a soft option. I very much endorse the fact that they are not a soft option. Having now had some experience of joining in with community sentences, I am satisfied that they are not a soft option. Part of building public confidence is to get over that we cannot tolerate breaches, because we have to make sure that community sentencing is a vigorous option. As for the discretion of the judiciary, I also sought to point out, as noble Lords can see on pages 170 and 172 of the Bill, that we want the magistrates’ court to deal with a breach. As set out in paragraph 6(2)(b), one of the ways in which it can deal with a breach is to amend the terms of the youth rehabilitation order. It can make additions or substitutions. In that way, it can deal with the very point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland.