Further written evidence to be reported to the House
Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill
11:15 am
David Heath (Shadow Secretary of State for Justice & Lord Chancellor, Ministry of Justice; Somerton and Frome, Liberal Democrat)
I concur entirely, Sir Nicholas, as I wish to get the creepiness award as well.
I wish to speak to the large group of proposals standing in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge. The group is broken down into three main areas of concern. Therefore, I will deal with those three areas in turn, rather than the wording of specific measures in the group.
The first area comprises amendments Nos. 114 to 119, which deal with the local authority residence requirement. As we know, that part of the youth rehabilitation order allows for a range of disposals. One is the intensive fostering requirement, where there are additional provisos before a court can impose it. The other is the specified local authority accommodation, where much more discretion is allowed to the court to use that disposal. That is an anomaly in the context of these amendments. If a child is to be taken away from their family home and, in effect, placed in detention—although I accept that detention is an inappropriate term for fostering, and I hope for much of local authority residence—or in the care of the state in one form or another, it seems appropriate that there ought to be at least some provisos as to the circumstances under which that can be used.
The suggestion in these amendments is first that this disposal should be used only where otherwise a custodial sentence might have been appropriate. That is a proviso that applies as far as the terms of the fostering arrangements are concerned and there seems no obvious reason why it should not apply to the local authority placement. We have established beyond doubt now that this can apply to a child as young as 10. We are dealing with very young children for whom such an enforced move out of the family home can be an intensely traumatic experience.
The second proviso is that the local authority should have some opportunity to consent, rather than simply being consulted, before that residential order is made. The reason for that is twofold. First, the authority must ensure that the appropriate facilities are available for the receipt of the child. Secondly, social services within a local authority should be able to have a strong say-so when it comes to whether that is an appropriate disposal and whether the court is correct in its view. There are already powers within the remit of the local authority to place a child in care without any offence having being created, but that decision is clearly made on the basis of the best interests of the child, which are paramount. That is rather different from an order that is made, one presumes, in the interests not only of the child but of society—in the form of a part of a rehabilitation order. We should consider whether the two disposals that require a change of familial environment for the child should be brought into approximate parity within the context of the Bill.
The second broad area includes new clause 6 and its ancillary amendment No. 109. New clause 6 deals with preconditions to imposing a youth rehabilitation order. In effect, it lifts the present proviso, which is there in relation to an intensive fostering order, to make it apply to youth rehabilitation orders as a whole. That is an important condition: that there is a right of representation before the court. A very wide palette of powers is being given to the court under the youth rehabilitation order. Many of them involve a significant, effective reduction in freedom of movement and of activity, or impose specific requirements upon the offender. There seems to be a parallel with custodial sentences. It seems odd that there is no right to legal representation for the child in those circumstances.