Policing and Crime Bill

Amendment 104 seeks to amend the Bill so that people under 18 would not have their alcohol confiscated by a police officer if they provided a reasonable excuse for possessing alcohol in public. This seems perfectly reasonable but I assure noble Lords that it is unnecessary. The Confiscation of Alcohol (Young Persons) Act 1997 already requires the police to consider when it is appropriate for them to seize alcohol from a young person. Section 1(3) of the 1997 Act sets out that a person commits an offence only if they fail "without reasonable excuse" to comply with a requirement imposed on them. In practice, that means that an officer has to consider the circumstances and decide whether it is appropriate to confiscate the alcohol from the young person in question. Naturally, that will include whether or not they have a reasonable excuse. In answer to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, about young people being picked on, one has to know the context in which this happens. Some of our areas and inner cities are a bit like wild lands, I am afraid. It happens in little towns out in the country as well; I know this from Dorset, where I used to have a cottage. You get groups of youngsters behaving in an appalling way, and they are well aware that they are doing so. It is not as if some person walking quietly along the street is going to get picked up for this. We have to get this into context. Before confiscating the alcohol, a constable is required under Section 1(4) to inform the young person that it is an offence to fail to comply with his request "without reasonable excuse". In practice, the constable cannot simply put the question of a reasonable excuse to one side as a matter that arises only if there is a prosecution for non-compliance; he will be using his judgment on the basis of the reasonable excuse. This is different from the situation in Clause 30, which makes it an offence to be in possession of alcohol in a public place on three occasions in 12 months. Under that clause, the offence is for possessing alcohol, but the clause contains a safeguard for children with a reasonable excuse for holding alcohol. A young person who is holding alcohol during a family picnic in a park, for example, is exempt from this power as he or she has a reasonable excuse for doing so and would not be penalised. On Amendment 106, a young person who is drunk on the street clearly poses harm to themselves and potentially to others. The Government are very clear that unsupervised drinking by young people under 18 in public places is unacceptable. It exposes them to alcohol-related risks and has clear links to crime and anti-social behaviour. All of us in this House understand that. It was a central message in the youth alcohol action plan published last June. Therefore, we want to make it easier for the police to confiscate alcohol from under-18s found in possession of alcohol in public. We believe that doing so will have a very positive impact on removing or minimising alcohol-related anti-social behaviour and crime and disorder. The police have told us that the requirement in the Confiscation of Alcohol (Young Persons) Act 1997 to prove an intent to consume makes it difficult for officers to take sealed containers of alcohol away from young people who are increasingly aware of this requirement—let’s face it, these youngsters can be very cute—and are using it to get round these powers. All it takes is for the young person to argue that the alcohol is not theirs because it is still sealed or they are holding it for someone else, and they cannot be touched. The provisions in Clause 29(4) respond to the very real concerns of the police we have been in dialogue with that they should have the powers they need to take alcohol away for under-18s in a public place, and we agree with them. If the amendment were accepted, the constable would continue to need to prove that the young person intended to consume all of the alcohol in their possession before that alcohol could be confiscated. It would mean that the police were not able to tackle effectively young people drinking alcohol in public. That, in turn, is almost certainly likely to have an impact on the anti-social behaviour that occurs in the communities and areas I have described. As a result, I am sure that noble Lords will agree that where the police have identified that existing legislation is not working as intended, we should be responsive to these concerns. As I said on the other two amendments, this is part of a total package of measures, all aiming at addressing these concerns. The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, asked about education in schools. We are looking at how we can do more in dealing with schools; DCSF is looking at that in the context of communities. We will make sure that the noble Baroness’s views are reflected in this strategy. There are all sorts of strands, all of which have to be pulled together. I hope that I have covered noble Lords’ concerns and I invite the noble Viscount to withdraw the amendment.