Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Perhaps we should leave that to those who are curfewed. For example, a curfew period of 16 hours will enable courts to curfew offenders for 12 hours overnight, as often happens now, but also to add a further period. This is designed to ensure that the offender is at home immediately before a community pay-back session to increase the likelihood of their turning up on time. More seriously, that illustrates the point that I just made about how this could be teamed with something else that the court wishes to achieve. If the curfew is timed so that the person will be at home before the community pay-back session, that is an imaginative way of using it. A young person attending school will need less restriction during the school week but could have their movements more tightly restricted at weekends, when they are at greatest risk of reoffending. That is another point. I am aware that the Prison Reform Trust does not share this view and believes that the courts already have sufficient flexibility to impose curfews. I know that this belief has been endorsed by the Bar Council. Both have commented on their particular concerns about the impact of these changes on children. While I understand these concerns, it should be remembered that the new curfew limits are maxima. They will be imposed only where such a requirement is, as the law requires, the most suitable for the offender and where the sentence is proportionate to the seriousness of the offence. In respect of under-18s, we expect the longer curfews to be used sparingly and that courts will take their age into account. It will be the court that decides whether and how to use this option. My noble friend Lady Linklater makes the case for when lengthy curfews would be disproportionate. Doubtless the court would see that in the relevant cases. The kind of aspects that my noble friend mentioned would be raised in court and taken into consideration. Compliance with curfew is normally monitored electronically through the offender wearing a tag. This will not change. Indeed, we are exploring ways of making more use of electronic monitoring as the technology becomes more sophisticated and robust. None of the existing safeguards will change. Courts will still be required by law to ensure that the restrictions on liberty imposed by any community order are commensurate with the seriousness of the offence, so longer curfews may be more suitable for more serious offenders. It will remain the case that before imposing a curfew requirement, the court will have to consider what the effect of the curfew might be on the person themselves and their individual needs and circumstances and on other people living at the curfew address. With longer curfews being available, it will be even more important that the courts take account of the needs and views of the family members before setting the curfew hours. Youth offending teams will assess the suitability of the home address for curfew purposes. They will make a recommendation to the court on what length of curfew is appropriate. We would expect that any longer length and duration of curfew would be focused on older children where the alternative might be custody. The point was made that longer curfews would interfere with work and children’s education. The law requires that all community order requirements, including curfews, should, as far as possible, avoid interfering with an offender’s work and education. I hope that that will reassure people. We believe that giving courts the power to impose longer curfews will contribute to realising the aim of making non-custodial sentences tougher and more demanding. In doing so, we hope that they will command greater confidence among sentencers and the public.