Rehabilitation and Sentencing

Lord Warner Excerpts

Tuesday 7th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Warner]

The Minister has not so far mentioned youth justice so perhaps I may ask him some questions about that issue. I welcome much in the Statement about rehabilitation and reoffending, but is he aware that many of the issues of concern expressed in the Green Paper—such as young people’s first entry into the criminal justice system, restorative justice, reducing custody, improving the rates of reoffending when they have been sentenced and giving the courts more options on sentences—have been pioneered by the Youth Justice Board and the changes in the Crime and Disorder Act? Can the Minister explain why the Government want to abolish a body that has done the very kind of things that are in the Green Paper?

[Lord McNally]

My Lords, I pay genuine tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Warner, as the chairman of the Youth Justice Board, and, as I have done before at the Dispatch Box, I put on record my admiration for its work. The decision to bring it in-house within the MoJ and to include it in the list of arm’s-length bodies to be abolished is a matter that is still before the House, but we of course hope that it will accept our recommendation. The general feeling is that the YJB had been a successful operation over the past 10 years. There were some criticisms of it here and there but, on the whole, it had been a success. However, that success now allows us to move to a stage where youth justice is much more a local and community responsibility undertaken by the successful operation of youth offending teams. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Warner, does not see the decision to abolish the YJB as a condemnation of it; it was a stage in the progression to what we hope will be a successful youth justice operation.