§ 15. Dr. StarkeyTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what measures he is taking to tackle persistent youth offending. [29863]
§ Mr. BlunkettThe Government's youth justice reforms include a wide range of measures to deal with persistent young offenders. We have delivered the youth justice pledge by halving the time from arrest to sentence for persistent young offenders; funded the youth justice board's intensive supervision and surveillance programme for the most prolific offenders; provided direct support to address youth street crime in London; and introduced the detention and training order for persistent and more serious young offenders. We are also providing the courts with new powers to remand to secure accommodation for those juveniles who commit offences while on bail.
§ Dr. VisTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prisons in the juvenile estate provide a pre-release scheme. [29606]
§ Beverley HughesAll juvenile establishments work with Youth Offending Teams to plan the transfer of the young person into the community phase of the Detention and Training Order. Juvenile establishments plan a young person's release from prison with the young person's community supervising officer and where applicable his/her parents or carers. Release is planned from the start of a sentence through a series of meetings and action plans. A final meeting takes place 10 days before release in order to finalise arrangements for on-going support in the community. The personal officer from the custody setting then attends the first training plan meeting in the community. This ensures that the two parts of the sentence are linked. Sentence planning forms part of this process and is, so far as is possible, tailored to individual needs.
§ Chris RuaneTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many young offenders aged 10 to 16 years are in institutions by region according to their home address expressed as(a) a percentage and (b) the total number, ranked in descending order according to percentages for the latest date for which figures are available. [30595]
659W
§ Beverley Hughes[holding answer 30 January 2002]: The number and percentage of juveniles (10 to 16-year-olds) detained in secure establishments broken down by home region on 31 December 2001 is shown in the table.
Home region Number of juvenile offenders in secure establishments Percentage of total number of juvenile offenders North West 230 17.5 West Midlands 203 15.5 London 188 14.3 Yorkshire 171 13.0 East Midlands 120 9.2 South East 97 7.4 Wales 93 7.1 Eastern 84 6.4 South West 69 5.3 North East 56 4.3 Total 1,311 100.0