Nick Herbert (Shadow Minister (Police Reform), Home Affairs; Arundel & South Downs, Conservative)

I want to raise an issue relating to the proposed additional power for community support officers to deal with truants. The Police Federation says that truancy is a serious problem which can be very time-consuming for fully sworn officers, and expressed the view that this is a sensible measure that should allow police officers to spend more time fighting crimes that require more skills, training and experience. It is also consistent with the type of powers that CSOs were originally envisaged to hold.

However, organisations such as the Howard League for Penal Reform have expressed concern about giving CSOs, who may be untrained, the power to deal with truants. A document from the Howard League points out that child truants are often very vulnerable and challenging, and awarding CSOs the power to remove them could put children and officers at risk. It states that child truants should be dealt with by people who are “expert and trained”. That is a perfectly fair observation on the need to ensure that CSOs are properly trained to deal with truants. The Minister said that clause 4 puts a training provision into primary legislation for the first time, which we welcome. Is that also the case in relation to clause 5 and the additional powers that CSOs will have to deal with truants? If not it is an omission, because training in the exercise of the power to deal with young offenders—albeit that it is something that we welcome CSOs being able to do—would be an important counterbalance to the extension of that power.

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