Secure 16 to 19 Academies Bill

Lord Bates Excerpts

Friday 24th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bach, for bringing forward this Bill and presenting it with characteristic clarity. He brings immense experience as a former Minister at the Ministry of Justice and as a police and crime commissioner. The whole House recognises that expertise.

There are several reasons to welcome the Bill and wish it a smooth passage through its legislative stages in your Lordships’ House. This is an example of legislative continuity in policy, which we need to see more of—especially in the criminal justice system, where change takes time because of the high risks of getting it wrong.

This slow pace is evident in the fact that the Bill, as has been mentioned, and the policy of secure academies were first proposed by the Taylor review in 2016. That review sought to address the problem that half of 15 to 17 year-olds entering young offender institutions had

“the literacy or numeracy levels expected of a 7-11 year old”.

In addition, 40% of those under 18 entering these institutions had not been in school since they were 14. This was a problem. In 2016-17, the Chief Inspector of Prisons, who inspects secure training centres and young offender institutions, observed starkly in his annual report that

“there was not a single establishment that we inspected in England and Wales in which it was safe to hold children and young people”.

The review’s conclusion was that

“education needs to be central to our response to youth offending”

and it proposed secure academies, which would be more a school with security than a prison with education. I am sure we all support this focus on education, which is the surest path to improving and transforming young lives—to give them hope and a future, which is what we all want for them.

We are now in 2025. So far, only one such academy is open, and the House of Lords Library briefing for this debate tells us that it has been temporarily closed because of security failings over locks and doors. I stress that this is not a criticism of Oasis Restore, which has an outstanding track record in education and courageously stepped up to take on this challenging new type of school, but rather a reflection of the slow pace of change. It is also a lesson to successive Governments that, if we want change, we need to get faster and more efficient in delivering innovation, less risk averse and more patient in paying attention to results.

In 2022, the National Audit Office produced a report on children in custody, HC 1257. It said that the estimated cost of converting the Medway Secure Training Centre into the new Oasis Restore secure academy was £4.9 million when it was proposed in 2016, but by 2022 it had risen to £36.5 million. That is 745% over budget. I do not know if £36.5 million was the final figure—perhaps the Minister can inform us in her response—but given that this was a new facility designed for around 40 people, the capital cost per person was close to £1 million. The revenue cost for secure training centres is already £156,298 per person. That compares with a pupil funding premium of £5,995 per year in mainstream schools. These sums are very large.

I do not mean to be critical of this Government, because this has been the policy of successive Governments. I also do not think anyone would flinch for a moment if this investment meant that the broken and vulnerable lives in these establishments could be restored and they could make a positive contribution to society in future. We live in a society where, rightly, we have judgment through which people are held to account for their actions, but we also need a society of the second chance, which holds out the possibility of redemption. We simply cannot write off the lives of children at the age of 12 or 13. Every life has potential.

This matters because these numbers matter. My fear is that, when officials and Ministers look at the future of secure academies and implementing this policy and legislation, they will be mindful of the costs of the Medway Secure Training Centre and the experience of the Oasis Restore trust. That could mean that we will see fewer of these secure training centres.

Officials implement policy, but Ministers develop it and parliamentarians are supposed to scrutinise it. We have had over 11 Lord Chancellors in the 10 years since the secure academy policy was introduced in 2016. Yet there is reason for hope, because the current Lord Chancellor, David Lammy, has immense experience in and real passion for this area, as demonstrated by the Lammy review, which was very influential. I am also delighted to see the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, in her place, because she brings immense experience and knowledge of the criminal justice system. There is hope for the future.

However, this is not the main focus of what I wanted to say. In reading up for this debate, I read a whole load of material on the youth justice system, and a number of things really surprised me. I want to focus on a more positive message around young people. One number that leaped out was that the number of children in custody reduced by 80% between 2011 and 2021—from 2,040 in 2010 to around 430 now. Noble Lords on this side of the House in particular, who always used to draw a correlation between the number of people in the prison establishment and the level of crime, might also be interested to hear what has happened to criminal offences proven to be committed by young people over that period of dramatic reduction. In 2010, the number of proven offences committed by children was 171,750. In the year ending 2022, that had reduced to 38,518. Why do we not hear more about these figures? Even with youth violence, which is prevalent everywhere you look, the number of violent offences proven to be committed by children and young people reduced from 35,000 in 2011 to about 12,000 now. These are remarkable statistics which we seldom hear. According to the NHS, last year saw the lowest number of admissions to hospital for knife-related assaults. We do not hear this positive news.

Fraser Nelson, the distinguished British journalist, wrote an essay for the Times, published on 8 August this year, titled “Violent, lawless, broken Britain? The facts tell a different story”. He is right. He points to the fact that most people, especially young people, get their news from social media, which often feeds on fear and exaggeration, and where bad news is amplified, drowning out the facts.

This matters. As the Violence Research Group at Cardiff University pointed out, serious violence in England and Wales has decreased substantially. This message needs to be better known, the group said, not least because of the fear of violence and the corrosive effect it has on individuals and communities. It makes children and young people feel less safe in our communities. To which I would add that it also erodes intergenerational trust, when the facts show that the current generation of children and young people is among the most law-abiding since the 1970s. Why do we not hear this more?

A report by Nacro, published in 2024, found that media coverage of young people is twice as likely to be negative as positive. Moreover, young people were labelled lazy, weak, selfish and dangerous, according to the report. Nothing could be further from the truth. Our current generation, I believe, is one of the most law-abiding that we have ever seen: they care more for the planet and care more for each other and for other people than any other generation in my living memory. Perhaps if young people read more of these affirming messages, they would realise how valued they are in our society and would be more positive about their future, and we might have even less need for these institutions in the future, too.