HC Deb 18 November 1976 vol 919 cc1545-6
5. Mr. Wyn Roberts

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he is satisfied with the present methods of dealing with young offenders.

Mr. Merlyn Rees

The Government's views on this subject were set out in the White Paper, Cmnd. 6494, containing their observations on the report from the Expenditure Committee on the Children and Young Persons Act 1969, which was published in May. They include a number of proposals for strengthening the law, consultations on which are now proceeding.

Mr. Roberts

Is it not clear by now that the juvenile courts should have power to order that persistent offenders should be kept in secure accommodation when they are placed in the care of local authorities? Is it not equally clear that it is wrong that faceless officials of the social services departments should have more power than the courts to decide the fate of certain offenders?

Mr. Rees

I am not sure in this field. I have been at it for only a short while, but after a time I should be able to talk with more certainty about these points. Indeed, I feel that in such matters the less certain one is the nearer to wisdom one gets. There is a problem of a small number—a minority—of particularly difficult and recidivist juvenile offenders. It is a matter of resources in one aspect. There is a problem about the relationship of the bench to social workers—I would not call them faceless—and in the Department we should like to do all we can with our colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Security as soon as possible.

Mr. Kilroy-Silk

Will my right hon. Friend accept that it is not satisfactory to remand to Prison Service establishments over 5,000 schoolchildren every year? With regard to young offenders generally, would not my right hon. Friend also agree that incarceration in penal establishments does not in any way affect their reconviction rate and that what we need, if we are to deal effectively with the problem, are far more imaginative alternatives than are being pursued at the moment?

Mr. Rees

Imagination and alternative methods of sentencing—this is the view I have formed in the short time that I have been looking at the issue—are undoubtedly matters that we should all consider. But that does not invalidate one of the major problems that comes to my notice every day concerning a small number of recidivist young people who are remarkable for the things they do. Imagination is not the answer to that problem.

Mr. Lawrence

Does not the Home Secretary agree that it is time that teeth were given to the powers of magistrates to deal with the recidivist hard-core offenders about whom he is talking? What efforts have been made by his Department to reallocate some of the resources that are available to it for the provision of secure establishments where discipline is an important factor in the treatment of those young offenders?

Mr. Rees

Before my time in the Department, steps were taken with grant aid to do something in that respect. If the hon. Gentleman has any ideas with regard to the law, I shall be pleased to listen to him. I hope, if all goes well—I cannot say more than that—at least to make some marginal changes in the law, if possible in the next Session.