Young Offenders in Adult Prisons (Hansard, 30 January 1985)

Lord Hunt
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.

§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Elton)
My Lords, on the latest available information, some 520 offenders aged under 21 sentenced to youth custody were located in adult prisons in England and Wales. Of these some 370 were either being allocated or serving net sentences of under 21 days.

Lord Hunt
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply, which I find very disturbing. Is it not a fact that the youth custody centres, which have capacity for something like 7,000 places, are full to overflowing? Is not the overflow which is referred to due in large part to the fact that magistrates' courts are making much greater use of youth custody than was envisaged in the guidelines supplied to those courts by the noble Lord's department after the passage of the Act? Do not the figures available in his department, and indeed from the survey conducted by NACRO on a year's working of the Act, bear out the fact that the use of youth custody is increasing? Quite aside from that, is it not a negation of the intention of the courts that a sentence requiring a specific and constructive training programme to be carried out in the totally equipped establishment is in fact carried out in the totally unsuitable, inappropriate conditions of an adult prison? Is this not a recipe for recidivism?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I am not certain I can encompass all the questions in one answer. But the general tenor of the noble Lord's query is to the trends in sentencing and the adequacy of provision. The number of juveniles given custodial sentences in the last six months of 1983 was slightly lower than that for the last six months of 1982. The slight increase in the number of young adults given custodial sentences was not out of line with the trend in recent years. Within the overall pattern of custodial sentences for young offenders there has been a shift from detention centre sentences to youth custody sentences. The reasons for this change are probably quite complex. However, I believe that, if the noble Lord examines the breakdown of the numbers of young offenders in adult prisons, he will find that the vast majority of them are there for a very short time and are kept strictly out of contact with adult prisoners.

§ Lord Campbell of Alloway
My Lords, does my noble friend the Minister agree that the answer that he 644 has just given brings into relief yet again the concern expressed by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice about being able to suspend youth custody sentences? I know that this matter has been discussed before but would my learned friend—

Noble Lords
Order!

§ Lord Campbell of Alloway
My Lords, can my noble friend the Minister inform the House as to where we are getting along this line?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for, however fleetingly, calling me a "learned" Lord! As I said in answer to a question which my noble friend asked on 15th January, we have sought the views of interested bodies on this issue. We are now considering the matter in the light of the comments that we received as a result.

§ Lord Glenamara
My Lords, would the noble Lord say what are the ages of the youngest offenders serving their sentences in adult prisons?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, not without notice, but not below 14.

§ Baroness Faithfull
My Lords, may I ask my noble friend the Minister whether the present situation does not bring the juvenile justice system into disrepute? This is a system whereby some children are sent to prison and some children go to youth custody centres though they have committed comparable offences.

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I think that without a full debate on this subject it is difficult to give an exact picture of the complex spread of provision and candidates. I repeat that we have a wide selection of provision. My noble friend has referred to "children" as though everybody from the age of 14 to the age of 20 was in the same category. Of course they are not.

§ Baroness Masham of Ilton
My Lords, is the Minister aware there is to be a new project in York which will be a day centre for the rehabilitation of young offenders? Might this not be a help in keeping them out of prison?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, we are very much aware of efforts being made in the direction of what is called intermediate treatment to keep young people out of custodial sentences. That is why we have committed £15 million to support it.

§ Lord Elwyn-Jones
My Lords, can the noble Lord say how many persons under the age of 21 who are on remand awaiting trial are held in adult prisons?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, at present about three-quarters of the number of young persons under 21 who are on remand are held in remand centres and about one-quarter in local prisons. All remand prisoners need to be held as close as possible to their families and friends, and also to their legal advisers and the courts where they are due to appear. But there are not enough remand centres to accommodate the existing population and to cover all the major urban court centres. The noble and learned Lord asked for an exact figure. I shall write to him.

§ Lord Elwyn-Jones
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. Is it not deeply deplorable that remand prisoners, many of whom will be acquitted altogether and some of whom will not receive custodial sentences, are nevertheless held in prison at that youthful age?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I took the opportunity, I think two years ago, to visit a local prison to establish what were the views of these young people. I asked them unloaded questions. I was very much struck by the fact that, with very few exceptions indeed, they preferred to be kept in a local prison, where they were accessible to their families and lawyers, than as little as 20 miles away in perfect conditions.

§ Lord Glenamara
My Lords, may I take it from the noble Lord's reply to my previous question that there are young people of 15 in prison? If so, is it not an appalling state of affairs, and what do the Government intend to do about it?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, the noble Lord returns to an issue. The latest figure I can give does not relate to children of a specific age but simply to juveniles in the juvenile bracket. On the latest available figures, 73 of these are in adult prisons. Thirty of them are on remand—and I have spoken about that. Thirty-eight have been sentenced to youth custody; and they are, I understand, all awaiting allocation. The process of allocation normally takes four to five days, and they are then shipped out on the next bus to an appropriate institution. They are kept separate from the adult population. I believe we have a flexible system, and that it protects the interests of young people.

§ Lord Mishcon
My Lords, may I refer the Minister to his answer to my noble and learned friend a moment ago as to young people on remand in adult prisons? Does he really feel that an interview that he had some two years ago with young people on their preferences as to where they are to be kept, however helpful and praiseworthy such an interview may have been, is really a social answer to the deplorable situation of young people on remand being put in adult prisons?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, the noble Lord is aware as the rest of your Lordships are that the present Government have the biggest programme of this century to expand and modernise the prison system and to bring it up to date after decades of neglect by earlier Governments. We are doing a great deal in this direction. The figures that I have given for those held in positions that the noble Lords think less appropriate, perhaps, than some others show that we are making tremendous progress. I hope that your Lordships will recognise that.

§ Lord Ferrier
My Lords, will my noble friend not agree that many of the interesting answers that he has given do not necessarily apply to Scotland?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, whenever possible I avoid giving answers about Scotland altogether.

Lord Hunt
My Lords, will the noble Lord accept that I, personally, have considerable admiration for the efforts being made by the Government in this matter? Will he not accept, however, that there is considerable concern on all sides of the House, and will the Government not consider that the time is coming to review the workings of Sections 6 and 7 of the Criminal Justice Act?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I gladly accept the first of the noble Lord's supplementary questions. As to the second, it is a function of this House to focus its concern on Ministers and for Ministers to transmit that to the Administration. That I gladly do. Whether I do it exactly in the terms that the noble Lord asked, I shall have to reflect upon.