Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

Debate between Baroness Kennedy of Shaws and Earl of Listowel

Wednesday 23rd July 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel]

My amendment would give 17 year-olds detained by the police the right to be held in local authority accommodation rather than a police station. I draw the Committee’s attention to the “Newsnight” programme broadcast on Monday 14 July, in which parents whose children had been affected by the current arrangements spoke very movingly about their experiences. I would be glad to furnish your Lordships with a link to that. Certainly, I will make it my job to ensure that those taking part in the debate have that link.

Children under the age of 17 already have the right to be placed in local authority accommodation, and for good reason. Police custody is an unsuitable environment for children. It is a highly intimidating environment and staff are not trained to support vulnerable children, unlike in local authority accommodation. Recent cases have demonstrated the terrible consequences that can result from detaining children in such an unsuitable environment at what is a deeply frightening time for them.

Kesia Leatherbarrow was a vulnerable 17 year-old. Her inquest has not yet taken place but we know that she was discovered dead in a garden in December 2013, after being arrested and held in a police cell for three days. Kesia was arrested for possession of cannabis and criminal damage. She was kept in custody at Ashton police station over the weekend before being sent to Tameside magistrates’ court on the Monday morning. She was bailed to return the following day, when the youth court would be sitting, but died shortly afterwards. Being held in the more supportive environment of local authority accommodation might have made all the difference. She could still be with us today.

Seventeen year-olds can appear very adult, but they are not: they are children. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is clear on this point—children are those below the age of 18, and all are entitled to the same protections. A 17 year-old should not be treated differently from any other child. However, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act is inconsistent on this point. The police station is the only remaining part of the criminal justice system where 17 year-olds are not uniformly recognised as children. The one other part where an anomaly exists—the Criminal Justice Act 1991 in relation to cautioning—will be amended by this Bill.

In police stations, 17 year-olds have some of the protections afforded to children but not all. This is an ongoing issue and one which the Home Secretary has said she will resolve. However, I am disappointed that she has not yet done so, despite a clear ruling from the High Court. In 2013, in the case of HC v Home Secretary, Lord Justice Moses ruled that it is unlawful for 17 year-olds in the police station to be treated as adults and denied the protection of having a parent or other adult with them, which is given to younger children. The court ruled that they must not be treated as if they were adults. In particular, they must be allowed to have a parent or appropriate adult with them. After the case, the Home Office accepted the court’s ruling and gave assurances that it would conduct a full review of all laws that treated arrested 17 year-olds as adults, not just the provision of an appropriate adult. For example, in a letter to Nick Lawton, whose son Joe killed himself after being treated as an adult in police custody, the Home Secretary wrote:

“We will ensure that in future that 17 year olds will receive the appropriate assistance and support while they are in police custody”.

Then in response to a Parliamentary Question in October 2013 the Minister for policing said:

“We will consider all legislation which appears to treat 17-year-olds as adults in the criminal justice system and bring forward legislative proposals as necessary”.—[Official Report, Commons, 21/10/13; col. 65W.]

Despite these assurances, the Home Secretary has so far made only limited changes that were specified by the High Court, which means that 17 year-olds now have the right to have a parent with them, as I have mentioned.

The point of most concern is the fact that young people have no right to be transferred to local authority accommodation even if the police are concerned about them and can see that they are very vulnerable. The police still do not have the right to make such a transfer. This is the matter that my amendment addresses. The parents of Kesia Leatherbarrow, along with the parents of Joe Lawton and Eddie Thornber, two other children who died after being treated as adults in police custody, are campaigning to get the Home Secretary to make the changes necessary to ensure that 17 year-olds are always treated as children in law. A recent letter to the Home Secretary said:

“I personally am very upset and feel wronged by both your letters because you have only changed one part of the code and failed to take the steps to get Parliament to amend any other relevant legislation. Had you looked into and changed all the legislation, as you intimated in your letter to me, there was a good chance that Kesia would be with us today. You could include in the current Bill before Parliament changes to Section 38(6) of PACE about the transfer to local authority care as opposed to being kept in a police cell overnight … We are distraught that another 17 year old has died unnecessarily when you as Home Secretary were fully aware of your duty to 17 year olds. While we cannot bring back our own children, we will not stop campaigning on this issue until every piece of legislation that treats 17 year olds as adults in the criminal justice system is amended to give the most vulnerable among us the help we are entitled to under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and other laws”.

We owe it to these families and to 17 year-olds throughout the country to ensure that they have the protection to which they are entitled. The right to local authority accommodation is a fundamental protection that is available to all other children, and I hope that the Government will make good on their promises and accept my amendment. I recognise that they have been looking at this issue, I beg the Minister to bring something into this legislation, perhaps by the time we reach Report. We can then be confident that no more young lives will be lost in these circumstances. I beg to move.

[Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)]

My Lords, I support this amendment. I urge the Minister, before we reach Report, to take the opportunity to contact a really wonderful NGO, Just for Kids Law, which is run by a remarkable set of lawyers led by Shauneen Lambe. The lawyers have been supporting and sometimes acting as intervenors in cases involving young people of 17 who are being kept in custody or interrogated without an accompanying adult. Anyone who is the parent of a teenager or whose children were recently teenagers knows that at that age a person is on the cusp of adulthood. They are moving out of childhood and into adulthood. It is often a very difficult stage where young people appear to be very mature and yet at the same time they are childlike and vulnerable, as the noble Earl said. I know that the Home Secretary and the Home Office have been looking at this issue—I see that the Minister is nodding his head in confirmation. For some time there has been a problem around the ages defined in different pieces of legislation. I would urge the Government to look at this amendment closely. Even if a categorical answer cannot be given to us today, I hope that the opportunity is taken to speak to the people at Just for Kids Law because they really know their stuff in this area. They have all the details about the families who suffer so terribly at the loss of their children.