§ 13. Mr. Andrew F. Bennettasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will ensure that medical records are available to the courts before a boy is sent to Send or New Hall detention centres for the short, sharp shock.
§ 14. Mr. Kilroy-Silkasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will require courts to consider a medical report before committing a boy to Send or New Hall detention centres for the short, sharp shock regime.
§ Mr. WhitelawThe pilot project will be established within existing legislation under which courts cannot be required to consider a medical report or medical records before passing a detention centre sentence, although they have power to call for such reports or records. The medical officers at New Hall and Send detention centres will in all cases consider whether persons received from the courts are physically or mentally unfit for the regime, and if so arrangements will be made for transfer elsewhere.
§ Mr. BennettDoes not the Home Secretary agree that it is almost impossible to make these judgments purely on physical appearance? Does he not think that it is essential that medical information is available to the courts before they make a decision? Will not the courts be held in contempt if they send a person to one of the centres and the medical officer then recommends that he be transferred?
§ Mr. WhitelawI do not accept the hon. Gentleman's last point. It is right for the medical officers at the centres to decide the matter, and I shall stick by that.
§ Mr. Kilroy-SilkDoes not the Home Secretary recall a. recent article by the medical officer at Send, which indicated that depression, suicidal gestures and overdoses were common among the boys at that centre? Did not that article also indicate that anxiety and depression—sufficiently serious to warrant observation and drug treatment—were common to 5 per cent. of the boys? They should never have been sent to a detention centre, especially one where a tougher regime is imposed.
Does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that if those medical facts had been known to the court in the first place, such an inappropriate sentence would not have been passed, and should not be passed in future?
§ Mr. WhitelawThe hon. Gentleman is criticising the existing regime. I believe that my proposal for medical officers is right and that we should see how it works.
§ Sir Ronald BellWill my right hon. Friend bear in mind that one of the most successful forms of treatment for drug addiction in Singapore and Hong Kong is precisely the sort of regime that will be operated in the short, sharp shock centres?
§ Mr. WhitelawI believe that my hon. and learned Friend is right, but we shall have to see how we proceed.
§ Dr. SummerskillDoes not the Home Secretary agree that as he has not revealed the exact nature of the regime to the House, and as it is an experiment, nobody—the prison officers, the courts or the doctors—can predict what will be the mental and physical effects of the regime? Even with a medical report they will be left in the dark as to the effects of the regime on the offenders.
§ Mr. WhitelawI have undertaken to announce the exact details of the projects before they begin.
§ Mr. LawrenceIs my right hon. Friend aware that there appears to be a campaign to misrepresent his proposals for a short, sharp shock as being an institution for physical and mental torture? Will he make it quite clear that the only object of the exercise is to provide a reasonable degree of discipline for young people who do not seem to know the meaning of the word?
§ Mr. WhitelawI am grateful to my hon. Friend for his remarks. I have made my position on the matter very clear. I have said consistently that there must be no question of brutality in these regimes, because if there were they would not work.
§ Mr. Arthur DavidsonIs it not time to stop calling the scheme a short, sharp shock regime? If it is to have any chance of success, it should have at least a proper title, otherwise "short, sharp shock" will become judicial phraseology. Those human beings who are sentenced will feel an understandable sense of grievance at being called by such an inelegant and inappropriate term.
§ Mr. WhitelawI note the hon. and learned Gentleman's remarks. He should give the pilot schemes a chance to succeed. The way in which I have set them out is a reasonable basis from which to start.