Disclosure of Youth Criminal Records

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Thursday 28th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Robert Neill]

That is certainly true, and it indicates the need for a much more joined-up and holistic approach to dealing with this matter. I am sure it is something we need to return to and address. Although it can only deal with a part of that problem, disclosure and barring needs to be resolved itself. The updating of the whole approach to dealing with criminal records, disclosure of information and the regulation of social media is important, because all of them can get in the way of helping people to turn their lives around.

The point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) about examples from other countries is significant. Our criminal justice system has some of the worst reoffending results among our comparators, and one reason for that is the difficulty of getting people back into employment, education, homes, work and relationships. To a greater or lesser degree, the mechanistic operation of the current disclosure and barring system can be a bar to people moving on in those directions, all of which, the evidence overwhelmingly shows, make people less likely to reoffend. We are getting in the way of that.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the cumulative impact of disclosing youth criminal records is an avoidable barrier to employment, education and housing, which can be devastating for a young person and can lead to long-term adverse effects way into adulthood?

[Robert Neill]

Yes it is, and the evidence, as I will perhaps demonstrate if I make a bit more progress, shows exactly that. That is entirely the problem that we find. The particular difficulty is that the system is not only mechanistic but is in practice arbitrary—there is no real discretion—and has no right of appeal to speak of. None of those can be just.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk) and others pointed out, certain things can be filtered out, but that is arbitrary. A single conviction can be filtered out, provided it did not result in a custodial sentence, was not for a listed offence—broadly, a serious offence, although that is probably not the issue most of us would take, as other bits come into it later—and that more than 11 years have elapsed since the date of the convictions. All the evidence suggests that, nowadays, for young men in particular, maturity and desisting from criminal behaviour kick in around the age of 25. Eleven years back from that, they could have been convicted as a teenager for exactly the sort of stupid incident that my hon. Friend referred to, which would then not be filterable at a time when they sought to move into education and work. That is an obstacle, as the evidence clearly shows, and it is no longer realistic, in our submission.

Single offences can be filtered provided that the sentence was non-custodial and was not a listed offence, as well as that more than 11 years have elapsed since the date of the conviction, or more than five and a half years if the person was under 18. That could still be within a key time when they were moving into their mid-20s and getting jobs.