Safety in Youth Custody

Debate between John Howell and Judith Cummins

Wednesday 20th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered safety in youth custody.

Thank you, Mr Wilson, for allowing time for this most important of debates. I am most grateful. The safety of our children and young people is of great and continuing interest to many Members of this House, and has been for many years. The question of safety has been discussed in numerous debates here and in the other place. In addition, it has been explored in numerous Select Committee inquiries—most recently by the Select Committee on Justice in 2013—and has been the subject of a tide of media attention, often following shocking revelations arising from the dedicated work of journalists. It is worth reflecting for a moment and asking ourselves why so many Members, people in our society, charities and third-sector bodies, and those in the media, are so tireless in their determination to protect the safety of our children and young people.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving way so early in her speech, which I am listening to very carefully. Has she considered the situation of young adults? The Justice Committee is doing an inquiry about that at the moment, and we have learned that the development of the brain means that many young adults are still effectively children when they are sent into prison.

[Judith Cummins]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that interesting point, which I hope to cover later.

My belief is that, no matter what someone’s upbringing is, and whatever their political affiliation and perspective on law and order, there is a shared and enduring view that the safety of children and young people is of paramount concern. Each and every one of us believes that we must ensure that each and every child and young person is able to feel safe, wherever in the country they live. As we all know instinctively, each child and young person deserves to grow up in a nurturing, encouraging and, most importantly, safe environment. That is true in all settings—in the home, in schools or, as we are debating today, in our custodial institutions. The setting does not matter because whatever the circumstances, and whatever children and young people may have done in their short lives, regardless of whether they have been found to have acted criminally, they remain children.

We have always quite rightly held children and young people to be different from adults. Children and young people with their whole lives ahead of them are still finding their way in life and learning what it is to make their way in the world. As we sorely know, too many children and young people, especially those who find themselves in custody and in the care system, far too often find their way in life in the most desperate of circumstances. Too many live in unsafe homes or go hungry. Too many see horrific things that no person, never mind a child, should ever see. Too many suffer from mental illness that is often unrecognised and untreated, or have not received the help and support that might, in better circumstances, have lifted them away from criminal behaviour and supported them into becoming successful, loving and humane children and young people.

At this point, I pause and acknowledge that we could very easily spend all day debating the desperate circumstances that so many children find themselves in, but that is not the topic today. Today, I wish to discuss just one very important element of the safety of, without doubt, our most vulnerable children—those who are held in our custodial institutions. In leading the debate, we cannot ignore the scandalous revelations of the past weeks, broken by BBC’s “Panorama”, concerning Medway secure training centre, an institution managed by G4S. I am sure we all recoiled with revulsion at the scenes that played out on our screens during the programme: young people subjected to the most horrific maltreatment and children struggling to breathe as they were restrained by apparent professionals. Such scenes in a documentary about prisons in developing nations would have sent a shiver up our backs, but those scenes took place in a UK establishment that exists to care for children while they are held in custody.

I do not propose to discuss the “Panorama” allegations in any great deal as they are subject to an ongoing police investigation but, as we debate this important matter, the scenes that we saw on our television screens should remain vividly in our minds because they confirm one thing: complacency is never an option. The safety of our most vulnerable children—those held in custody in establishments throughout the country—is forever fragile and under threat. We must be forever vigilant. Further incidents are only a hair’s breadth of complacency away.

With those thoughts clear in our mind, it is worth reminding ourselves of what this House passed into law in 1998. The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 did two important things. First, it stated that the youth justice system’s principal aim was to prevent reoffending by our children and young people. Secondly, it established the Youth Justice Board, which was given the job of making that noble aim a reality. The Youth Justice Board, in setting its strategic objectives for 2014 to 2017, recognised that an undeniable cornerstone of successfully helping children back into society is

“to promote the safety and welfare of children and young people in the criminal justice system”.

In recognising that safety and wellbeing is a fundamental cornerstone of the successful rehabilitation of children and young people, the Youth Justice Board acknowledged in clear and unambiguous terms what we all know instinctively as parents, as brothers and sisters, as aunties and uncles and as other family members: where children and young people feel unsafe, insecure, intimidated and under threat of violence, everything else becomes background noise. Efforts to help children to socialise, learn and become confident in themselves stop and begin to regress, as do efforts to teach children the values and principles of choosing to live respectfully, humanely and in a law-abiding manner in society and communities.

If the principal aim of the Youth Justice Board is to prevent reoffending, safety in custodial institutions is not only key, but imperative. Without it, helping children and young people to become respectful, humane and law-abiding adults is an empty hope. Everything else is simply background noise. The question is: what success is our youth justice system having in ensuring that children and young people are being held in a safe environment while they are custody? Sadly, from the statistics provided by the House of Commons Library, the picture is depressing and worrying. That remains the case for the use of restrictive physical intervention—in layman’s terms, when staff restrain children—incidents of self-harm by children, assault on children and young people in custody or, most damningly and depressingly, deaths in custody.

Thankfully, the number of children who have been committed to custody in recent years has steadily fallen. All hon. Members would surely welcome this improving position but, although the number of each type of incident has dropped over recent years, the number of each type of incident per hundred children and young people in custody—the most accurate measure—has steadily increased. Whichever way we look at it, those in custody are becoming proportionately more likely to find themselves in an unsafe environment. With the “Panorama” revelations of the past weeks in mind and the erosion of safety in our custodial establishment only serving to bring the issue into sharper focus, it prompts the question: what are this Conservative Government doing to improve the safety of children and young people, and to help them to re-enter society, equipping them to become law-abiding, respectful and humane members of our communities?

In recent years, there have been a number of expert reports that have explored the safety of children and young people in custody. Inquest, alongside the Prison Reform Trust, released a report in 2012 raising important questions about the number of self-inflicted deaths in our custodial institutions. More recently, in 2015, Inquest released another report raising unsettling questions about deaths in our institutions. The Howard League for Penal Reform released a report in 2011 exploring the questions of restraint in our institutions—that work has become especially resonant following the “Panorama” revelations of the last week. I pay tribute to each of those organisations alongside so many others that I have not been able to mention which, through their continuing and valiant efforts, are successfully keeping the question of safety so firmly on both the parliamentary and public agendas.