Policing and Crime Bill

Baroness Whitaker Excerpts

Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 16th November 2016 Lords Chamber

We should welcome that. It is a very positive signal that here in the capital such data collection will be done in future. I hope that other police forces follow suit and that when the Minister comes to reply to this debate, she will give a fair wind to this excellent amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I add my support to the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, to which my noble friend Lord Rosser has added his name. She has hit eloquently on an important omission in our capacity to deal with young offenders.

When I and members of the Gypsy and Traveller communities first lobbied for an extension of the census categories to include Gypsies and Travellers, before the increase in our Roma population, we did so because important areas of discrimination, resulting in significantly poorer life chances, were undocumented and a minority ethnic population of very long standing was simply unrecognised in many sets of official statistics. When we eventually achieved this in 2011 we thought that at last the public services would begin to understand more about the significantly worse outcomes in health, education, employment, housing and experience of the criminal justice system endured by many from these communities.

It remains disappointing that the Youth Justice Board has not taken advantage of the opportunity of the 2011 census categories to map more accurately what happens to young Gypsy, Traveller and Roma people. I am grateful for useful meetings with the noble Lord, Lord McNally, as chair of the Youth Justice Board, and his officials on the subject. His acknowledgment that the current system is not robust was welcome and I appreciate his commitment to improvement in data gathering. However, the fact remains that records still do not consistently capture more of the reality of who the young people who go through our criminal justice system are.

There are, of course, some external obstacles. Many young people from the Gypsy and Traveller communities are fearful of admitting their ethnicity because of the bullying and exclusion which has been meted out to them in the past. But trust can be developed if the information is shown to be helpful.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said, it would be very important to be able to correlate the probable overrepresentation of these young people with literacy levels and mental health status—also referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Alton. Their experience of education and accommodation has often been deeply unsatisfactory, but we cannot begin to make these links and to do something about it until we have the data tools.

As has been said, we know that both HM Inspectorate of Prisons and the lead chief constable for Gypsy, Traveller and Roma issues have called for the change the amendment would provide. The excellent Irish Chaplaincy's Traveller Equality Project has really positive evidence of good practice to justify the use of up-to-date information in the adult prison estate.

I hope, therefore, that the Minister will see the point too and accept this amendment.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of Amendments 228A and 228B in the name of my noble friend Lady Brinton. The arguments for ethnic monitoring are well versed and I will touch upon them briefly. As has already been said, without ethnic monitoring it is very difficult for public services to identify, and therefore address, any inequalities which vulnerable groups may be experiencing. As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has said, whenever there have been research or studies into the experiences of Gypsies, Travellers and Roma in custodial institutions—in either the youth or adult estates—these communities are almost always shown to have worse experiences and greater care needs.

Voices Unheard: A Study of Irish Travellers in Prison found that over 20% of Traveller young offenders were identified as having mental health issues. This is an alarming number and needs a co-ordinated effort in order to be addressed. However, as we know, without ethnic monitoring and consistent data it is unlikely that such an intervention would take place. As the report’s author, Dr Conn Mac Gabhann—I hope I have pronounced that correctly—said in an interview on this issue recently:

“While ethnic monitoring will not solve all the problems Gypsy and Traveller children face in the youth criminal justice system, it will be an important step in helping us to highlight the problems and issues they face and ensure these issues become a target to be tackled”.

I have little more to add to the very powerful speeches of my noble friend Lady Brinton, the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker. They have covered the ground extremely well. I hope the Government can support these amendments and ensure that the issues affecting young Gypsies and Travellers in the youth justice system can finally be addressed.