Clause 6
Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill
2:00 pm
David Hanson (Minister of State, Ministry of Justice; Delyn, Labour)
As the Committee will recognise, clause 6 will abolish the five existing community sentences for young offenders and replace them with a generic youth rehabilitation order, which we have spent some time discussing in Committee. The question of implementation is important and I am grateful to the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate for raising that today. Obviously, the Bill needs to pass through both Houses of Parliaments before it will receive Royal Assent. It is likely that that process will be completed by early to mid-2008 at the earliest. My perspective is that the sooner that that is done, the better, but obviously it will take some time. Given that, I do not expect that we will implement the legislation until 2009 at the earliest.