My Lords, I add my voice to the chorus of consent as to what this amendment is all about. It seems to arise from the Government’s wish to include specifically punitive requirements in order to, as the Minister for Justice has said, put punishment back into sentencing. The goal is to appear to be tough. This move is simply crude, inappropriate, and very unlikely to realise outcomes that are positive or helpful in any way in the long run. It raises the fundamental issue of what the ultimate goal of sentencing is, or should be, and where the balance should lie with punishment for its own sake. Here I agree completely with the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, that when the Government talk about punishment in this context it implies something painful, distasteful and unpleasant. I am clear in my own mind that the reduction of reoffending should be the prime purpose of sentencing, when sentencers make their choices from the available options.
If punishment has its place, we know from the Government’s own research that punitive options on their own achieve nothing in terms of reducing reoffending, and only when allied with other constructive sanctions have they any impact. There is a real risk that requiring sentencers to add this extra element will restrict their freedom to set appropriate sentences based on the facts and circumstances of individual cases. Invariably, there will be a range of support needs at issue. We know, as we have already heard, that the majority of those coming before the courts have significant mental health and learning difficulties, as well as substance misuse, real social deprivation, and so on.
What constitutes exceptional circumstances when what may be exceptional in the general population is more like the norm in the offending population? Their needs are indeed exceptional, so what are the courts to do when the exceptional is the norm? I have put my name to Amendment 6, which seeks to,
“leave out ‘exceptional’ and insert ‘special’”,
to try to make a meaningful distinction, but in the end the courts must be free to decide this issue, as has been commonly agreed. They have to be trusted to find the right balance between punishment and rehabilitation in the decisions they have to make based on individual circumstances and need. Punishment can be used but emphatically not for its own sake and should always be combined with rehabilitative requirements if the ultimate goal of reducing reoffending is to be achieved. It follows, therefore, that the various elements of a disposal must be compatible with each other. I echo
what has already been said and remind my noble friend the Minister that all requirements do indeed represent a punishment where freedom is being curtailed. It is true that we have a long way to go before all community sentences are as effective as we would like them to be, but punishment for its own sake is not the answer.
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