Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Emma Lewell-Buck and Edward Argar

Tuesday 9th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Edward Argar]

The hon. Lady rightly highlights the importance of the draft Domestic Abuse Bill, which we hope to bring forward as soon as we have fully considered the recommendations of the Joint Committee on the draft Bill. I know that is something that came up in evidence and in the Joint Committee, and it is something we will be looking at very carefully.

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

My constituent Claire Ball was sexually abused as a child. She bravely went through the trauma of giving evidence against the perpetrator in court. Throughout that process, Claire was given less support than the perpetrator, had no option for witnesses to support her and, disgustingly, was accused of “leading him on”. He was found not guilty—Claire has still not been given a clear reason why—and has remained living close by. Can the Minister explain to me and to Claire, since she must relive the trauma every time she sees the perpetrator, when the Government will redress the inequity faced by child sexual abuse victims in our justice system?

[Edward Argar]

The hon. Lady makes a powerful point. The issues to which she alludes are likely to fall under the responsibilities of both the Crown Prosecution Service and the court. I am happy to meet her to discuss the specifics of the case and, as appropriate, take them up with the Solicitor General and the Attorney General.

Child Imprisonment

Debate between Emma Lewell-Buck and Edward Argar

Tuesday 25th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Edward Argar]

I enjoy taking interventions from the hon. and learned Lady, and although I am always somewhat nervous about what may be coming in my direction, she was kind in that last intervention. She rightly highlights the experience in Scotland. We are aware of that, and I take a close interest in it. The debate on the efficacy and future of short sentences is alive, and I am sure that she and other hon. Members will participate in it.

The youth justice system offers courts and other decision makers a range of flexible sentences that can be used to address a child’s behaviour and offending. Those range from informal diversions to cautions, community sentences and custody for the most serious offences. The Government believe that there will always be some children for whom custody may be the appropriate and necessary sentence, but we are equally clear that it should always be a last resort, and for a period of time in line with the seriousness of the offence.

In 2018, 26 sentences were given to children for murder—by “children”, I mean those under 18 who fall into the care of the youth justice system, for which I am responsible—and 44 for wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. In 2017-18, 32% of custodial sentences given to children were for violence against the person and possession of weapons—that goes back to the offences I mentioned earlier. Notwithstanding the point made by the hon. and learned Lady, we believe that those offences involve significant public protection concerns that must also be carefully considered in any future approach.

The age of criminal responsibility in England and Wales is 10. Custodial sentences are available for children from that age, although their use is restricted, and the courts have a statutory duty to consider a child’s welfare during sentencing. Children under 12 will only ever receive a custodial sentence for the most serious offences where neither a community sentence or fine can be justified. Furthermore, we recognise that needs can differ among different age groups, and the sentencing guidelines reflect that. For example, detention and training orders are not available for under-12s, and can only be given to children aged 12 to 14 if they are considered to be persistent offenders. Returning to the definition of “child”, about 95% of those who receive a custodial sentence are 16 and 17-year-olds.[Official Report, 11 July 2019, Vol. 663, c. 3MC.] That is still a small number. I take the underlying point that the hon. Member for South Shields is making, but we should be clear about the age that is predominantly reflected in those who receive custodial sentences.

It is also clear that custody is used sparingly. Although proportions of sentence types have remained stable, the overall numbers are much lower than they were 10 years ago. For example, in 2017-18, just under 1,600 immediate custodial sentences were given to children, in comparison with about 15,500 community sentences. The proportions were 7% and 68%. In 2007-08, there were nearly 5,800 immediate custodial sentences, but the proportions were 6% and 68%, so they have been relatively consistent.

I am clear that custody needs to be in the right environment to rehabilitate children, which goes to the shadow Minister’s point. I have never shied away from the fact that, as I said in my evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, in many cases we are not delivering the best outcomes for children. That is why we are committed to reforming youth custody and ensuring it is a place of safety and learning that is able to rehabilitate the young people who need to be there.

As the hon. Lady and the shadow Minister said, HMIP inspections of YOIs have identified safety and purposeful activity as key areas for improvement. The shadow Minister referred to what the chief inspector of prisons said in 2017-18. He is a decent chap, and I know that he would want to be clear for the record that the Chief Inspector of Prisons subsequently moved away from that and does not maintain that there are no safe institutions. However, he was right to highlight what was said at the time. We have taken several steps to address these issues and in 2017, following that, we began a comprehensive reform programme to ensure that the services provided in custody are aligned with the increasingly complex needs of the children in our care.

Since 2017, the number of operational frontline staff in the YCS has increased by almost 40%. We have recruited more psychologists, healthcare staff and frontline officers, who are being appropriately trained in mental health and trauma-informed approaches. Earlier this year, the YCS began implementing a new evidence-based behaviour management strategy and integrated care framework, and we have built two new enhanced support units for those with the most challenging needs. We are also working with education providers and devolving additional funding to commission more educational, vocational and enrichment activities.

The ability to work with children displaying complex needs requires a very specific, very important set of skills. We are therefore also investing to improve the quality of our staff training. We have introduced a new youth justice specialist role tied to a foundation degree in youth justice to teach the latest in effective practice in youth work and rehabilitation. More than 400 staff have enrolled so far, and we are aiming for every prison officer in the YCS to have undertaken that training by 2023.

There will always be a need for a degree of security and a form of custodial setting. Alongside improving the existing estate, we are changing the fundamental approach. Last year, we announced the creation of the country’s first secure school, to be developed in Medway in Kent, which the hon. Member for South Shields referred to. I have huge respect for her, but respectfully disagree. I believe that secure schools are the right way to proceed to ensure we move away from the concept of a prison with education to that of a school—an educational setting—with a degree of security. I believe that that strikes the right balance.

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

Does the Minister appreciate that that is what secure training centres were intended to be at their inception almost 20 years ago, and that it has not worked? The Government are going down the same track with the secure schools model.

[Edward Argar]

I would argue that secure schools are not a rerun of secure training centres. The Government recognise that there is a need for a secure custodial setting as part of the youth justice system, but we believe that education should be to the fore. The hon. Lady will have seen that, unlike for secure training centres, we are looking to education providers, rather than to established organisations dealing with custody and security, to run secure schools. We are very clear that, with the investment we are proposing, we can redesign and improve the Medway facility, achieving value for money for the taxpayer and adopting a different culture and approach in that setting.

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

I am conscious that the Minister is coming to the end of his comments. One of the key questions I asked was this: what is the timetable for phasing out YOIs and secure training centres, as the Government promised in 2016?

[Edward Argar]

We have made it clear that we will open Medway as the first secure school, with a second one to follow. However, we wish to assess at each stage how well the system is working, how effective it is, and whether any improvements are needed along the way, so it would be wrong to set a date for a full and complete replacement and roll-out. The hon. Lady would not expect me to do that without testing the new model to ensure it adapts to reflect the experience, as it is completely different from the secure training centres. As I said earlier, all Governments must accept their share of responsibility for the system today. In a moment, I will address the questions that the shadow Minister asked.

We will give the leaders of secure schools freedom and autonomy, similar to the freedom enjoyed by headteachers, to create relationships, care and practice centred around the needs of the children. This new model of youth custody draws on the ethos and practice of schools, with the structure and support of the secure children’s home model. I look forward to announcing the provider of the first one at Medway very shortly.

Despite the successes, children leaving custody are the most likely to reoffend in the whole criminal justice system. Reoffending rates are far too high for children sentenced to custody for six months or less. That relates to the points made by the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West. We believe that short periods in custody can have a negative impact on a child’s rehabilitation. It can disrupt family relationships which, as the second Farmer review showed, can be fundamental to supporting rehabilitation and reducing future offending.

The Secretary of State for Justice set out in oral questions earlier this month the persuasive evidence that short custodial sentences do not work, and that community sentences can be more effective in reducing reoffending and keeping the public safe. I know that Members of all parties share that view, and I hope we will continue to see progress.

Let me turn to some of the questions that hon. Members asked. The hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West talked about the need for young people entering custody to be placed as near to their home as possible. She is right that, occasionally, there are needs that mean that that cannot happen. In cases where there has been gang-related violence or serious youth violence, there may be a genuine need to separate some young people in the custodial estate. She is right that that goes to the heart of maintaining family and other relationships.

It is always a pleasure to be cross-examined by the hon. and learned Lady and, indeed, by the whole of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. I have read its report carefully, and I will be responding to it on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government very shortly. I can speak only for this Government. I do not know whether I will still be a Minister in five weeks’ time, but I can speak as one today. We will be responding very shortly.

The hon. and learned Lady mentioned the Taylor review recommendation about children’s panels. That is certainly an interesting idea. The principles underpinning it—understanding and addressing the root causes of offending—are absolutely valid and the right ones to look at in the context of the youth justice system. However, to implement the idea exactly as suggested would, to my mind, represent a significant change to the approach in this country, which still puts a judge, or a sentencer, at the heart of sentencing. As she will have seen from our response, we did not accept that recommendation, because we recognised the broader impact it would have on how our justice system operates.

The shadow Minister, and possibly also the hon. Member for South Shields, mentioned doctors’ access to patients. Doctors can always access patients directly where there is a medical need and the doctor makes that medical judgment.

The hon. Lady and the shadow Minister mentioned restraint. The training around restraint is very clear: it points to de-escalation, and the non-use of restraint is the priority. The training is there to provide officers with the skills to use. On pain-inducing techniques and restraint more broadly, as both hon. Members alluded to, the Taylor review has been under way for a while. One hon. Member—I think it was the shadow Minister, but it may have been the hon. Lady—asked when we can expect that review to be published. I will not comment before it is published, but we have said that we anticipate it will be published by the summer. I look forward to being able to do that and respond in due course, if I am still in this post.

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

The Minister is being generous with his time. He seemed to indicate that pain-inducing restraint was used only for de-escalation. He will have heard from my opening comments that there is testimony from children saying quite the opposite. This is causing children pain. Has he seen the MMPR? Is he confident that it is not causing children harm? Would he want it used on any of the children he knows?

[Edward Argar]

The point I was making—forgive me if I was unclear—is that the training given to officers emphasises de-escalation as the key and the first step to be taken. It is only when there is no alternative that there is escalating use of different techniques. However, the hon. Lady made her point very clearly. As I said, I will wait until I have seen the Taylor review and we are able to publish it. I suspect that this issue will return to the Chamber in some form at that point.

A number of right hon. and hon. Members, particularly the shadow Minister, raised removal from association. We are clear that that would not be defined as isolation, not least because there is meaningful human contact with officers, medical professionals and, indeed, education professionals, who throughout any period of removal from association bring learning activities to an individual’s cell and work with them. There is no removal of meaningful human contact for the entirety of that period. There is human contact, but the shadow Minister is right that there is a definitional point to be considered. We discussed legal definitions and their different interpretations at length in the Joint Committee on Human Rights. He understandably elevated his point by saying that although we can argue about definitions, he has concerns about numbers and the operation of removal from association.

The shadow Minister also mentioned the assault rate, the segregation rate and a whole range of other factors. I urge a degree of caution with respect to statistics expressed as numbers per 100. I mentioned in my testimony to the Joint Committee that, as the numbers go down, it is largely only those who have committed very serious, often violent offences who are sentenced to custody. They are a very concentrated cohort. As the shadow Minister alluded to, they are challenging and challenged individuals in terms of their backgrounds and experiences, but they are a much more concentrated group who are much more prone to violent offences than previously. That is a challenge. It does not necessarily negate his point, but I wanted to put a bit of context around the statistics and how they are interpreted.

The shadow Minister mentioned budgets and funding. He is a fair and decent man, so I know he would recognise the role played in the financial situation by the previous Labour Government’s mismanagement of the national finances.

This has been a very important debate. We need to think differently about how we deal with children who offend. We must ensure that we place at the heart of the system the need to break the cycle of reoffending before those young people become adults, and we must understand the trauma they have often experienced, which may well be a driving factor in their offending behaviour. The courts should have available to them a wide range of sentencing options for all those who are at the age of criminal responsibility, to ensure that we adequately address children’s offending behaviour. Sometimes, as a last resort, that may warrant a custodial sentence.

I am clear that the term “under 18” encompasses children at many different stages of development, so a different type of sentence, cognisant of the individual circumstances of the person, will be necessary in each case. However, I am also clear that custody should be available as a sentencing option in only the most serious cases. The youth secure estate requires real reform to ensure that custody, where it is used, is used effectively. I will bear very much in mind the comment by the right hon. Member for Twickenham about remembering my history and where we have been before in seeking to ensure that any future change is meaningful and achieves the results we would all wish for.

Let me conclude by thanking you, Mr Hosie, for your chairmanship. I thank all those who contributed, and I thank the hon. Member for South Shields for bringing this important debate to the Chamber.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Emma Lewell-Buck and Edward Argar

Tuesday 23rd April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Edward Argar]

I believe that the key to seeing fewer victims of crime is effective rehabilitation of offenders and breaking the cycle of offending. That is exactly what I and the Secretary of State are focused on.

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

My constituent Kristian Thompson would have been 27 years old today had his life not been taken when he was 19 years old after he was the victim of a one-punch attack. His mam, Maxine, set up the charity One Punch UK. This week is One Punch Awareness Week when many people who have lost loved ones are pleading with the Government to follow Australia and Canada and create a one-punch law imposing a minimum sentence for perpetrators. Why are the Government continuing to resist doing so?

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady and I send my sympathies to Kristian’s family and friends on the terrible events that she has just described. I am very happy to look at what she is proposing, and if she would like to write to me, I will respond as fully as I can.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Emma Lewell-Buck and Edward Argar

Tuesday 18th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

Ofsted’s recent annual report yet again raised its concerns about high levels of violence in children’s secure training centres. The use of pain-inducing restraint techniques in youth prisons and right across the secure estate has been found to carry up to a 60% chance of causing serious injury to children. This is Government-sanctioned abuse of children. When is it going to end?

[Edward Argar]

As the hon. Lady will be aware, we have commissioned an independent review, which is being led by Charlie Taylor. I look forward to receiving his report in due course.