Clause 20 - Anti-social behaviour orders:
Drugs Bill
2:30 pm
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)
We went through clause 19 so quickly that I was not able to ask my question about a suitably qualified person—the Minister will have to write to me. I wanted to know when the specifications will be forthcoming from the Secretary of State.
I move swiftly on to clause 20, which deals with antisocial behaviour orders. My right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) made most of the points that I wish to make in his opening address on Second Reading. I want to give the Minister the opportunity to pick up on those points. A new order can be made alongside an ASBO when drug misuse has been a cause of the behaviour that led to the ASBO being imposed.
Statistics on page 27 of the Home Office publication, ''Perceptions and experience of antisocial behaviour: findings from the 2003/2004 British Crime Survey'', show that 25 per cent. of people experience drug-related incidents of antisocial behaviour. Paragraph 56 of the explanatory notes shows the size of that problem. Some 15 million incidents fall into that category. I believe that there could be 4 million acts of drug-related antisocial behaviour annually.
Paragraph 56 states that
''it is estimated that this proposal will produce some 100 orders per year, resulting in an annual assessment and treatment cost of approximately £0.37 million. The Criminal Justice System costs are minimal.''
That means that one in 40,000 drug related antisocial incidents will be picked up by the provision, so how effective does the Minister envisage the remedy will be? The measure will also be delayed until April 2006, and I would like some explanation of why it will take that long. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden said, it makes the provision meaningless for another 15 months, which is a fairly long time. I hope that the Minister will address those points, which were, rightly, raised on Second Reading.