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5.47 pm

Mr. Phil Willis (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD): I congratulate the Conservatives on choosing this important subject for debate. However, as the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) and the Minister for Children were making their speeches, many Members may have been recalling meeting constituents who had been the subject of abuse and for whom the Bill has probably come too late.

I recall three young men who were systematically abused in a children's home in Harrogate—the life of at least one of them has been blighted by those experiences. If they have been watching the Parliament channel this afternoon, I wonder what they make of a debate that has been nothing but a party political wrangle about who did what to whom and how much each party intends to spend. It is a shame when debate on such an important subject is brought down to no more than a party political wrangle—[Interruption.] I can assure the Under-Secretary of State for Health, the hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman), that I have no intention of joining in such wrangling but that I shall address the subject of the debate.

The debate would have had far greater relevance if the Bill had been published in this place and we had read it. We could then have held an informed debate with the Minister, which would have been incredibly useful. Instead, we hear that the right hon. Lady will make a statement tomorrow; presumably, she has chosen to launch the Bill elsewhere in London rather than in the House. If that is not the case, I shall of course be happy to take an intervention from her. We did not have the way forward report, either; if we had, we would have been far better informed about the consultation exercise and its aftermath.

Ironically, the Conservative party failed, in choosing the wording of the motion, to mention the crisis in two very important areas—the youth justice system and refugee children. During the Queen's Speech, the Leader of the Opposition tramped round the television studios in Westminster, condemning the Government for threatening to remove benefits from children and condemning the fact that they would be incarcerated. It is the height of hypocrisy that he marched his troops into the Lobby in favour of the Bill when it came before the House this week.

There can be few groups of children in the United Kingdom who suffer more from racial and institutional abuse than refugee children. What other group of children can be detained without limit, without excuse and without having committed any crime other than to be the children of parents who have come to Britain seeking asylum? So far, those in that group can be detained by as much as 20 weeks, simply because they are the children of asylum seekers.

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Following an inspection of the Dungavel immigration and removal centre in October 2002, Her Majesty's chief inspector of prisons said that

"the positive development of children was compromised by the secure nature of the facility and the uncertainty surrounding the length of stay".

Why are those children not important? Thirty-five children are currently being detained under these laws, yet there is not a word about them from Ministers or the Opposition.

Mr. Dawson : I agree with everything that the hon. Gentleman has said on this subject. Does he, like me, look forward to the day when the areas of youth justice and asylum and immigration currently under Home Office control might fall within the remit of my right hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for children and families?

Mr. Willis: I say to the hon. Gentleman, who has a proud record in defence of children's rights, that I do, with one proviso: that the Minister have an independent portfolio, because without that independence it will make little or no difference.

If the Conservatives are serious about the protection of vulnerable children—I believe that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham is, because he asked a significant number of questions on that and we were all informed as a result of those questions—I hope that they will join the Liberal Democrats in pressing for an end to the detention of innocent refugee children in secure prisons, because that is a blight on anything that we do to achieve a better position for vulnerable children. I hope that the hon. Gentleman at least will do so.

Interestingly, too, the motion makes no reference to children involved in the youth justice system, despite the successive criticisms of Her Majesty's chief inspector of prisons and the damning comment in the joint chief inspectors' report in January 2003, which found that

"the welfare needs of children and young people who commit offences were not being adequately addressed by those responsible for their welfare".

Mrs. Brooke : Will my hon. Friend join me in asking the Minister to consider extending the Children Act 1989 to the Prison Service? A recent High Court judgment found that local authorities have responsibility for children in prison. Given all the terrible tragedies in our prisons, it would make a big difference if the Prison Service were to apply the Act.

Mr. Willis: I thank my hon. Friend for that comment. Let me say to the Minister in all sincerity that if we discover, when the Bill is published tomorrow, that the Children Act 1989 will not be extended to prisons and young offenders institutions, she will have a case to answer, and in Committee we shall make a good argument for its extension. The Minister cannot say now whether that is in the Bill, because the Bill has not been published; that is fair enough.

The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has repeatedly criticised successive Governments—both Conservative and Labour—for the way in which children in trouble with the law are treated and for our failure as a nation to integrate the

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UN convention on the rights of the child into juvenile justice. Under article 40, we are expected to separate the system for dealing with children from that for adults. Again, that may well be proposed in the Children's Bill, but it is a sadness that that has not yet occurred. Article 3 of the convention says that we should ensure that the interests of the child are a primary consideration in all decisions about them. Article 37 says that custody should be used only as a last resort.

Those principles are important because, despite the numerous criticisms and child protection failures in the youth justice system, the Government have not set out a clear role for youth offending teams or the Prison Service when dealing with the child protection system. As a distinct group, children in the care of our youth justice system are more likely to die, self-harm and face serious risk to their well-being and future success than almost any other group of children. It is a pity that the Minister does not take on board that powerful statement, which is borne out by all the evidence.

Although many people are delighted when some young people end up in custodial institutions, we have failed to realise that the vast majority of cases involve highly damaged young people and that the system that operates does absolutely nothing to support them. They are the group most likely to come from homes where abuse is common, neglect is the norm and other systems of care and protection have failed.

The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham is right about the delays and confusion in introducing not only the Bill but other commitments, following the tragic death of Victoria Climbié and the Laming inquiry. He is right to point to the appalling debacle of the Minister's handling of the children's fund. The Minister proudly said that she had got £20 million more for the fund as a result of its success. That is stretching credibility. What actually happened is that she stopped the fund. She told groups all over the country—they were sometimes in the middle of three-year contracts—"You aren't getting any more money."

The hue and cry of right hon. and hon. Members and voluntary groups throughout the country forced the Minister to reconsider and provide additional money. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that those projects have no guarantee of funding even in their third year—never mind beyond that—and the Minister should state in summing up the debate that every current three-year contract will be honoured. If that is the case, I shall feel that at least one successful thing has come from the debate.

Mrs. Brooke: Does my hon. Friend agree that the apparent lack of consultation before and during the cuts has affected the relationship with voluntary organisations and that a commitment to greater consultation is needed, as well as the pledge of money?

Mr. Willis: The hon. Member for Sure Start—the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw)—said that the voluntary sector is crucial. I am sorry to refer to a Committee in-joke that relates to the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs. Laing), who has now left the Chamber. My hon. Friend is right to suggest that the voluntary sector is crucial in terms of the proposed Bill and supporting

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vulnerable children, and the removal of funding from the children's fund was a devastating blow to many of those organisations.

The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham made a brief reference to the national service framework for children. The motion refers to the delay in producing that framework, which was announced in 2001 as a huge leap forward. After reading the motion, I was interested about what had happened to the national framework. We know, and it was said earlier, that children's mental health services are in a mess—and were in a mess 10 or 20 years ago. Children's mental health services are one of the absolute disgraces of our health service.

Three years after the organisation was announced, its director, Professor Aynsley-Green, said in his December newsletter to its staff, who had all been appointed:

"There are of course many milestones which have been met along the way"—

he did not mention one—

"in particular the recognition of the importance of children's mental health services and neo-natal care".

If, after three years, the organisation's only claim of success is a recognition of what it knew three years previously, my goodness, it is not much of a success. That is one reason why we will support the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham in the Lobby tonight.

I have much sympathy with the Government's desire to create a lasting framework to address the long history of high-profile abuse cases that have blighted young people's lives for far too long. If the delays are an attempt to get things right and to address the difficult matters of prevention, identification, information collection, transfer and, above all, action, the wait will be worthwhile. If, however, when we see the Bill tomorrow it fails to address those complex issues, the Government will be rightly condemned.

We have always supported the aims of the Green Paper and have been as one with the Government in welcoming a commitment to a children's commissioner, a single support structure in local authorities and, crucially, direct responsibility for the protection of vulnerable children. A situation such as that in which the former chief executive of Haringey excused failures of child protection because

"he was not clear in his own mind as to where the line of responsibility lies"

must never be accepted in the future. The Minister and the Government are absolutely right to say that somebody in every local authority must have ultimate responsibility. I hope that the Bill will make it clear not only that such blatant buck-passing will not be accepted, but that it will be treated as a criminal offence. We will give the organisation teeth by making it clear that the person in charge is responsible under the law, as well as on paper.

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