Clause 36 - Anti-social behaviour orders
Anti-social Behaviour Bill
9:45 am
Mr James Clappison (Hertsmere, Conservative)
I hope that I have made it sufficiently clear that I do not oppose ASBOs, but I advise the hon. Lady to have a proper understanding of just how effective they have been.
The hon. Lady advances another interesting argument in favour of ASBOs, which Ministers have also advanced from time to time, although they have stopped doing so recently. This is the theory that ASBOs are so frightening that they act as a deterrent on those who are minded to commit antisocial behaviour. The hon. Lady will have to accept that that is a difficult theory to test. It is difficult to find any statistics that prove that they are a deterrent, but I would be very interested in any such statistical
evidence. She must agree that the argument depends on the assumption that those who commit antisocial behaviour have quite a lot of legal knowledge about ASBOs.