§ Mr. BUCHANANI wish to raise the question of juvenile crime, particularly in Glasgow and Scotland. I have been reading a paper this morning in which it is reported that the hon. Member for Leith (Mr. E. Brown) made the statement that Scottish Labour member have not raised the question of Scottish housing sufficiently well in this House. I do not know whether that statement applies to all Scottish Labour Members. I do know that, so far as I and my colleagues from Scotland are concerned, if the hon. Member looks at the Order Paper, the OFFICIAL REPORT and various other records, he will find that no body of Members has raised the question of the conditions of the people, particularly housing, more keenly and with more regularity than we have done. I attend regularly here, I put Questions on these subjects, and, to-day, I take this opportunity of raising the question of juvenile crime in Scotland which is linked up with the problem of housing as with other problems. I think this is a matter to which the House, even in the dying stages of this part of the Session, ought to give consideration. A few days ago I asked the Secretary of State for Scotland the average number of persons between the ages of 14 arid 16 found guilty of any form of crime in Glasgow and I also asked for comparative figures relating to the years 1925, 1924, 1923 and 1922. I find that from 1922 onwards there has been a steady increase of crime among young persons between the ages of 14 and 16 in Glasgow. One must bear in mind that while we have this increase in juvenile crime we find, if we consult the Prisons Report, that apart from last year—when the mining dispute led to certain increase in the number of offences returned—there is a welcome tendency for crime to decrease among the adult population.
§ LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. William Watson)A very marked tendency.
§ Mr. BUCHANANYes, and that tendency is due to two reasons. First, the population of Scotland, to their credit, are becoming increasingly sober, 1710 and, secondly, education and other forces are at work to bring about an improvement. But while the adult population is becoming increasingly law-abiding, there is an ever-increasing tendency towards crime among youths between 14 and 16. In 1922 there were, in Glasgow, 1,500 boys found guilty of some form of crime, and in 1926 there were 1,871 boys found guilty of some form of crime—an increase of 360 or about 20 per cent. That would be bad enough in the case of adults, but in the case of juveniles such an increase in crime calls for the attention of this House and of the Scottish Office. It is not enough to say that these boys are bad or that those who have influence over them are bad. Wherever you have crime there is a cause for it. The great mass of criminals are not bad simply because they want to be bad. There is some reason or other for the existence of crime, and repression is no solution of the problem. We ought to devote our minds to trying to find the cause and then seek to remedy the cause as quickly as possible. The figures in reference to girls are not large for a population like that of Glasgow. This only goes to show that, generally speaking, the female is more law-abiding than the male. I can never understand why we have hesitated so long about granting women the franchise and equality in various spheres of life, because, if we look into criminal statistics, we find that the female population, adult and juvenile, are more law-abiding than the male population.
In 1922 in Glasgow there were fewer than 40 girls convicted of any form of crime, but in 1926 there were 60 convictions, showing about the same percentage of increase as the figures regarding the boys. I wish the Lord Advocate to state what steps the Scottish Office are taking to deal with this increase in juvenile crime. I think there is a tendency among the Glasgow police—though on this point I am not going to dogmatise—to become rather too rigid in arresting young persons who may be committing technical, but not very serious, offences. Whether we like it or not, young people will amuse themselves, and in a city like Glasgow with a population of over one million there are many districts where the young people have no open spaces and no facilities for recreation. They will amuse themselves in the streets and in the places 1711 where the law forbids them to do so. Take, for example, the Gorbals Division which is the second biggest division in Glasgow and in residential population is actually the biggest. There is a voting population of 41,000 and the total population, including women and children, is probably nearly double that figure. In that constituency there is hardly an open space or a football or a cricket pitch for the youthful population. There are one or two small playgrounds with swings for young children but no open space suitable for youths between the ages of 14 and 16. Unfortunate as is this increase in juvenile crime I think it would be an appalling circumstance if boys of that age were not to play at all and I would ask the Lord Advocate to use his influence with the Glasgow police and the Glasgow Corporation to be a little less strict regarding minor offences which arise from the desire of the young people to amuse themselves. I have heard it said that they "loaf" at the street corners and stand about here and there but it is the duty of the Scottish Office to try to provide for them some reasonable alternative.
There is also linked up with this subject the question of unemployment and here we find a tragedy. In a city like Glasgow we have large numbers of boys and girls every year leaving school and one of the reasons why we have only 60 girls convicted of crime as against over 1,800 boys, is the fact that the girls at the age of 14 find an easier market for their labour than the boys can find. Shipbuilding and engineering are the chief trades in Glasgow and boys of 14 are not sufficiently mature to enter those trades, the usual age being 16. On the other hand girls are taken into the laundries at the age of 14 and are dispensed with when they reach 16 or 18, in cases where the Trade Boards Act or the Insurance Acts operate. Boys are unable to find any useful occupation between the ages of 14 and 16. Society says to them "We cannot provide you with work; we cannot find you any useful occupation, we cannot give your parents any maintenance grant to enable them to keep you at school, and therefore you must straggle about the streets finding some mischief to do.'
1712 I had a case in my own Division, but I will not raise it for two reasons, first, because I do not want to attack any magistrate unless I give proper notice that I intended to do so, and, second, because I want to try to raise the question in another way. But, if I may use it as an illustration, I would like to say that two boys, who had been in trouble before, stole milk which was worth 1s. 4d., and they were sent to a reformatory for4½; years. I am not to say that the magistrate was right or wrong, but here is the tragedy of it. The boys are put into a reformatory, and it costs the nation to keep each boy 30s. a week after he has become a criminal. Would it not be good national business, instead of paying 30s. a week to keep a boy after he is a criminal, if the Secretary of State for Scotland would consider making some maintenance allowance, not of 30s. a week, but of less than one-third of that sum, to keep the boy at school, so that they would not be criminals at all?
I want, therefore, to ask the Lord Advocate what steps the Secretary of State for Scotland is taking in compelling, or asking, the local authority to provide reasonable open spaces for the children and to see that the law is not enforced almost to breaking point against the younger children. Cannot the Lord Advocate consider the point of circularising the magistrates and local authorities throughout Scotland with regard to the First Offenders Act? I think there is a tendency among, many magistrates, on a first offence, to inflict a penalty. I had a case where they inflicted for the first offence six stripes of the birch rod. Kindly treatment meted out on the first offence will in most cases either make or mar the whole of a person's life. I hope the Lord Advocate will turn his attention to the problem which I have stated in Glasgow. It may be said that it is a matter of gangs, but I do not think that applies to the cases I have been speaking of. Most of the boys in the gangs in Glasgow are over 16 years of age. It may be described as Glasgow's underworld, but I think the great majority of the boys are over 16. I think, in almost every case that has come before the Glasgow Sheriff Court in recent years, that that is the position. Therefore, it does not touch the problem that I am raising. But, even in regard to the 1713 gangs, there must be some cause for the gangs, and you must bear in mind that the problem of the children who are between the ages of 14 and 16 may become the problem of the gang to-morrow. The questions which I have been raising are not of international importance, but they do affect common, decent folk living in one of the great cities for which the Government are responsible.
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§ The LORD ADVOCATEObviously these are questions to which anybody who is interested in the children of our country will be ready to give careful and anxious consideration. There is no doubt that in Glasgow as distinguished from the rest of Scotland as regards juveniles of both classes, those between 14 and 16 and those between 16 and 21, matters have not been stationary in the last few years. There has to be a distinction drawn, between the marked decrease that there has been generally in the numbers of crimes and offences all over Scotland and what has happened in the City of Glasgow during the last five or six years. As the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) has already told the House, undoubtedly there has been a marked increase in juvenile crime in the City of Glasgow as regards both those classes. I may inform the House at once that my information is that the majority of this increase, in both classes, is in the nature of such offences as are committed by boys and youths in gangs, such as breach of the peace, betting, gaming and lotteries, playing football on the streets, and obstructing the footways.
§ Mr. BUCHANANMay I point out that what we mean by gangs of boys over 16 are not those who have been playing football? What has been generally interpreted as gangs have been those which have committed such offences as criminal assault.
§ The LORD ADVOCATEThen let me use the word groups. I do not want to use the word gang in any restricted sense. One of course is alarmed and made anxious by an increase of that kind. Hon. Members who do not know it already will be interested to learn that, some time ago, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Scotland set up a Committee 1714 for this very purpose, which has been sitting for some time. A question was asked about it by the hon. Member for Leith (Mr. E. Brown) the other day, and as to when its Report was expected, and the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Scotland stated that the Report was expected in the autumn. I am sure the hon. Member for Gorbals has read the Report of the Prison Commissioners, and he will see on page 7 of the Report that this question about the treatment of juvenile offenders and their cases is a point on which evidence has been given before that Committee. I would mention that the right hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Adamson) is a member of that Committee, and this is the very point which is the subject of their investigation. Therefore, my right hon. Friend has anticipated the sort of method which doubtless is in the mind of the hon. Member for Gorbals. It is obviously a matter that ought to be inquired into, and it has been and is being inquired into at the present time. It is not as if the increase in Glasgow was a rise in this last year; it is a rise that has been going on for some time, and these figures are available and were partly the reason for setting up this Committee. We look with anxiety and interest to see the Report of that Committee.
I do not need to add much, except to say that quite obviously— everyone realises it now—the provision of playing grounds and of open-air spaces for the youth of our cities is one of the most vital matters and one which should be urgently kept in front of all local authorities and of those who are interested in the matter; and everyone wants to sympathise with the very important movement that is going on at the present time to help that result, because clearly, if boys play football in the streets, it is because they cannot get football fields in which to play. As the hon. Member has said, it is the best thing in the world that they should play football, but it is not only obstructive but dangerous to play football in the streets. The real cure is, I agree with the hon. Member, to provide open spaces, and that is primarily a matter for the local authorities, but it is a matter which, although I do not actually know about it, I should assume the Scottish Board of Health would keep 1715 constantly in view in considering the general health of the population. Undoubtedly, it is typical of the kind of question that this Committee will be considering at the present moment, and we shall all await the report of that Committee with great interest.
§ Mr. BUCHANANIn the meantime, will the right hon. Gentleman not consider the advisability of calling the attention of the magistrates in Scotland, by letter, to the First Offenders Act? I remember that the Home Secretary in England some considerable time ago did something of that kind.
§ The LORD ADVOCATEI need only say that I am quite sure that that has been done already. It may have been some time ago, but I will certainly look into the matter.