The
Committee consisted of the following
Members:
Burrowes,
Mr. David
(Enfield, Southgate)
(Con)
Byers,
Mr. Stephen
(North Tyneside)
(Lab)
Clwyd,
Ann
(Cynon Valley)
(Lab)
Cruddas,
Jon
(Dagenham) (Lab)
Dunne,
Mr. Philip
(Ludlow)
(Con)
Featherstone,
Lynne
(Hornsey and Wood Green)
(LD)
Hain,
Mr. Peter
(Neath)
(Lab)
Hanson,
Mr. David
(Minister of State, Ministry of
Justice)
Hesford,
Stephen
(Wirral, West)
(Lab)
Hewitt,
Ms Patricia
(Leicester, West)
(Lab)
Howarth,
David
(Cambridge)
(LD)
Lucas,
Ian
(Wrexham) (Lab)
McGuire,
Mrs. Anne
(Stirling)
(Lab)
Ottaway,
Richard
(Croydon, South)
(Con)
Penrose,
John
(Weston-super-Mare)
(Con)
Stuart,
Mr. Graham
(Beverley and Holderness)
(Con)
Mark Oxborough, Committee
Clerk
attended the
Committee
Fifth
Delegated Legislation
Committee
Wednesday 12
November
2008
[John
Bercow in the
Chair]
Draft Youth Justice Board for England and Wales (Amendment) Order 2008
2.30
pm
The
Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Mr. David
Hanson): I beg to
move,
That the
Committee has considered the draft Youth Justice Board for England and
Wales (Amendment) Order
2008.
I
welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Bercow. This draft order makes
technical changes to the administrative responsibility for discharging
the Secretary of States functions regarding the youth justice
system. The Youth Justice Board for England and Wales Order 2000
enabled the board to exercise, concurrently with the Secretary of
State, a wide range of functions in relation to youth justice and the
youth justice system. This draft order adds other functions to that
order, mostly relating to the letting of contracts for the provision
and running of young offender institutions. The immediate need for the
board to be given those powers relates to my intention to transfer
management of the contract for the running of Ashfield young offender
institution from the National Offender Management Service to the Youth
Justice Board, shortly I hope, if the order is
approved.
The
draft order also makes what I hope are small additions to the
concurrent powers of the board. Powers are added regarding privileges
and incentives in secure training centres. The order also makes two
changes to the boards responsibilities for placing young people
in custody. First, it deals with the sentencing of those who are
detained at Her Majestys pleasure, and, secondly, it examines
long-term detention issues. It makes minor amendments to the
boards responsibilities in those two areas. Finally, a minor
amendment is made to the young offender institution rules on the
receipt of
information.
Richard
Ottaway (Croydon, South) (Con): That last point about
young offender institution rules relates, of course, to intercept. Is
there any suggestion that that intercept will be used as evidence, and
if so how does that square with the Chilcot report on that
subject?
Mr.
Hanson: I will certainly look into that for the hon.
Gentleman.
Richard
Ottaway: The Minister does not have
long.
Mr.
Hanson: I will do it in a moment. I am seeking advice. I
was not aware that the order examined that issue. I will look at the
matter in detail for the hon.
Gentleman.
The
issue of the young offender institution rules on the receipt of
information brings together a number of
points.
2.33
pm
Sitting
suspended for a Division in the
House.
2.48
pm
On
resuming
Mr.
Hanson: Before the Division interrupted us, I was speaking
about the fact that the order makes a minor amendment to the young
offender institution rules relating to the receipt of information. I am
pleased to tell the hon. Member for Croydon, South that the issue that
he raised has no impact upon the order. The only change that we are
making is to allow the governor to disclose information to the Youth
Justice Board, if it is managing the contract. That does not affect
authorisations to intercept, or how or when communications may be
intercepted.
I
hope that I have been able to give a brief overview of what the order
does. It is of a technical nature and I commend it to the
Committee.
2.49
pm
Mr.
David Burrowes (Enfield, Southgate) (Con): It is a
pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr. Bercow. You may recall
the spring of 2000, when this type of order, considering the function
of the Youth Justice Board, was last before the House. That was a
bright spring morning on 17 April, and looking at the record I see that
the Chairman noted that it was very hot and gave us the discretion to
take off our jackets. I do not think that that is necessary today, but,
nevertheless, it is
bright
The
Chairman: Order. I sometimes say it before the start of
proceedings, but I had not anticipated that it would be necessary
today. For the avoidance of doubt, if the weather causes the hon.
Gentleman or any other hon. Member to want to take off his or her
jacket, that hon. Member is very welcome to do
so.
Mr.
Burrowes: I am grateful, Mr. Bercow. In April
2000, the right hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Clarke)
particularly welcomed that direction, as he made clear himself at the
time. But I will not avail myself of that great generosity.
We benefited
from some sun today, but we also benefit from the experience of how the
Youth Justice Board has functioned, not only since the original Youth
Justice Board for England and Wales Order, which the Committee
considered in April 2000 and which extended the functions in relation
to the secure estate for children and young people, but since September
1998 when the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 came into force. That Act
provided the architecture for the Governments programme, as
they put it, of reform of the youth justice
system.
On
that sunny spring morning in April 2000, hopes were no doubt high. The
right hon. Gentleman set out four objectives which no doubt still form
the context of the order before us today. He
said:
The
first is to... ensure that there is a clear focus on preventing
further offending by children and young people who are sentenced to
custody.
The second
objective is to ensure that juvenile custodial facilities deliver
accommodation and regimes of a high standard, and better value for
money. The third objective is to ensure that those who are remanded or
sentenced to custody are placed in appropriate
accommodation. Fourthly, the boards commissioning and purchasing
function is expected to ensure the appropriate type, volume and
geographical spread of juvenile secure places. Those are the specific
purposes and improvements to which we hope the draft order will give
rise.[
Official Report, First Standing Committee on
Delegated Legislation, 17 April
2000.]
We
have to consider those aims and objectives and assume that this order,
which is an extension of that order, shares them. The order was passed
without dissent. Now, eight years on, we need to draw on the evidence
of how the Youth Justice Board has worked and ask how well it has
functioned in relation to the secure estate for children and young
people. The main issue to consider today is whether it is right to give
the Youth Justice Board a concurrent power with that of the Secretary
of State to enter into contracts for the provision and running of youth
offender institutions and to exercise effective oversight of the
running of those institutions.
One could
seek to dress the order up as a tidying-up exercise, a phrase that we
have heard in other contexts. In fact, the order is described as an
internal administrative one. One could suggest that it brings matters
into line with powers that were there in the 2000 order as part of a
transitional provision that has now reached its end zone; it is simply
exercising what is there in relation to secure training centres and
enabling the Youth Justice Board to have contract responsibilities in
relation to YOIs, provided and run under contract by private companies,
such as at
Ashfield.
However,
the order raises more fundamental questions about whether it is the
right time to extend the functions of the Youth Justice Board, rather
than address whether its present functions are being exercised
effectively. We need to assess the performance of the Youth Justice
Board. We need to look at that particularly in relation to the
functions of the custodial estate over the last eight years, whether it
is performing effectively and whether it merits having those functions
extended in the area to which the order seeks to take
us.
That
is an important question given that two thirds of the Youth Justice
Boards budget is spent on the custodial estate, with 5 per
cent. or so being spent on prevention. A whole lot of money is being
sucked up effectively into the custodial estate. We need to judge how
it is performing. But the Committee should not take only my words as a
critique of what has happened. The Centre for Crime and Justice Studies
highlighted the Youth Justice Boards failure to reach its
targets on the number in custody,
stating:
Since
2000-2001, when...the YJB had taken over responsibility for
commissioning custodial places, spending on youth justice has increased
in real terms by 45 per
cent.
Since
the Youth Justice Board began commissioning secure accommodation in
2001, it has set various targets for reducing the number of children in
custody. The CCJS
states:
Performance
is deteriorating, with the numbers of children in custody rising by 207
from 2,676 in March 2005 to 2,883 in February 2008, an 8 per cent
increase,
and that figure has
since increased. It went on to
state:
This
is the first time there has been an overall increase in custodial
numbers during a period when the YJB was aiming to achieve a reduction
since the very first target was
set.
Another
example of the Youth Justice Boards performance is its target
to keep young offenders close to their families, which is no doubt a
key target in their
rehabilitation. The target is to keep them ideally within 50 miles of
their families. At the end of February 2008, 914 of 2,662 offenders
were held more than 50 miles from home, meaning that over a third of
offenders are effectively too far from home, even by the Youth Justice
Boards own assessment, and 10 per cent. of offenders were held
more than 100 miles from home. It is important to look at that
performance because the order seeks to extend the Youth Justice
Boards formal involvement in commissioning to the secure
estate, involving youth offending institutions.
Another area
relates to the targets for educational activity in youth offending
institutions, which is no doubt close to your heart, Mr.
Bercow. The target for educational activity is 25 hours a week, but one
has only to go to Rochester to see that that is barely reaching six
hours. The target for literacy and numeracy is an improvement of 80 per
cent, but the Youth Justice Board is failing to meet those important
targets. One could go through several targets and express concern about
the failure to meet them.
In the
context of the order, how does the Minister square the criticism of the
Youth Justice Board with the orders proposal to extend
commissioning functions? The reoffending rates show that around 76 per
cent. of young offenders are being reconvicted within two years, and
the reoffending rates themselves are much closer to 100 per cent. What
evidence is there to suggest that the order will help to reduce those
sky-high reoffending
rates?
Let
us look at the Governments terms of the argument and the recent
youth crime action plan to see where they seek to take us on youth
justice, because I am keen that there should be continuity between
someone being in the custodial estate of a young offenders institution
and their resettling, which does not exist in the youth justice
custodial estates. How does the continuity that we need to see and that
the Government seek to address in the youth crime action plan properly
chime with the order? There seems to be a recognition, perhaps almost
an admission or confession, within the youth crime action plan that the
Government accept that there has been a breakdown in the relationship
between what happens in the custodial institutions and what happens in
the community, particularly when one moves to resettlement. Once they
are out the door there is little contact to ensure that what good has
taken place in the custodial estate is carried on in the resettlement
and
accommodation.
The
Government supposedly addressed those concerns in their plan by stating
that they wish to give new duties to local authorities. Those new
duties include improving education and training in juvenile custody;
placing new duties on local authorities to commission education and
training in juvenile custody; and improving education and training by
giving local authorities a statutory duty to fund and commission
education services. For the first time, young offenders in custody will
be brought under the education legislation regime, so there is a move
towards improving the relationship between local authorities and the
activities in custody. The question for the Minister is whether that
move should be allowed full consideration following the plan, to see
whether commissioning arrangements need to be more closely tied with
the local authority rather than presently, as would be the case with
this order, being put full square in the hands of the Youth Justice
Board.
Mr.
Bercow, you will be aware of perverse disincentives, particularly in
the case of children in care. Once they reach the custodial threshold
there is an incentive for them to be off the budgetary books of the
local authority and into a custodial setting. A child with many deep
needs and expensive problems would be off the local authoritys
hands and, as we have often sadly seen, not properly picked up in
custody. There is a concern that that link is not properly made and
that a disincentive applies that leads to all too manyat least
30 per cent.of those who have been in care being in
custody.
In the
context of the order, does the Minister recognise the criticism of the
Governments approach to youth justice, which many of us say is
preoccupied with a managerial, centrally driven approach, and that this
order takes us a step in that samewrongdirection, when
there are, perhaps, glimmers of light within the youth crime action
plan? Is now the time to go against the flow of that plan? Has the
Minister considered alternative commissioning arrangements, which
involve local authorities to a greater degree? The explanatory notes
suggest that this is an internal administrative matter not requiring
any public consultation, but would this not be an appropriate time,
when the youth crime action plan has been launched and when there are
concerns that commissioning should move in other directions, for the
Government at least to pause for thought and consultation with
organisations involved in the welfare of children, to consider whether
there is an alternative route?
Given the
failings in the youth justice system and the criticisms I have outlined
of the Youth Justice Boards performance, particularly in
relation to commissioning, the explanatory notes case that the
Youth Justice Board is best placed to exercise powers in this order is
not made. I look forward to the Ministers response but we are
minded at this stage not to support the
order.
3.3
pm
Lynne
Featherstone (Hornsey and Wood Green) (LD): May I say what
a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship, Mr.
Bercow? I have five direct questions for the Minister and the answers
will determine whether we support the order.
First, what
is the relevance of disclosing such sensitive information to the board
or other specified persons? If the information is needed for
statistical monitoring, should it not be expressly given anonymously to
safeguard the privacy of the young person?
Why is an
officer of the Secretary of State included among the specified persons
to whom this sensitive information can be disclosed, in article
3(1)(b)? Why is there no definition of who these officers are, either
in this statutory instrument or in the young offender rules of 2000? Do
they include civil servants and, if so, why do they need such
information? Since the section entitled Amendment to the young
offender institution rules 2000 essentially restates the 2000
rules, except for the inclusion of the provision including the board
within the specified persons, will the Minister tell me what use is
being made of these provisions and whether they have been reviewed or
whether they are simply being restated? Lastly, where is the evidence
for the need to delegate the
Secretary of State for Justices powers to the board? Why are not
the provisions being publicised and debated on the Floor of the
House?
3.5
pm