Police and Justice Bill

I rise to support this amendment whole heartedly. I hope noble Lords will forgive me if in some respects I echo what the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, has said. Although she is no longer in her place, I echo the very favourable remarks that the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, made about the development of CSOs, which is clearly very important, constructive and necessary. We are all agreed that the presence of CSOs can make a very positive contribution to policing and potentially represents a bridge between disaffected young people and the police. We also know that a great deal of CSOs’ time is spent with young people. Over half do so daily and 81 per cent at least weekly. It follows therefore that it is vital that they are properly equipped for this role and for the appropriate exercise of their powers. The noble Viscount referred to their safeguarding duty. It is vital that that should be properly discharged and explicitly included under Section 11 of the Children Act 2004. We hope to get some reassurance on that. Training is clearly central, as is consistency of approach. The Common Core of Skills and Knowledge, published by the DfES, is the obvious starting point. Indeed, without it, it is likely that many CSOs will be significantly disadvantaged, and the chances of failing to deal properly or adequately with what are often very challenging situations can be very high. As we have heard, many CSOs do not feel adequately trained or prepared and as many as 59 per cent have been in situations that they felt not adequately prepared to deal with. This is very pressing. The Common Core of Skills consists of six basic areas. They are excellent areas. People have spent a lifetime doing PhDs on each one of those basic areas, which go to the heart of what is involved in dealing with young people. None of them can be acquired without considerable time and thought. That raises questions about the time, level and intensity that will be applied to the training of CSOs. We need reassurance from the Government that they will commit explicitly to a training programme for all CSOs and tell us what it will consist of. It would also be helpful to know what plans are in place for training not only the current CSOs but the 24,000 new ones that are planned to be recruited. Does the Minister have a timescale for that? What is the figure for the financial resources that will have to be committed, as they will be quite considerable? What will the training programme be, and how long will it take? Without clarity for such plans, the expansion of the number of CSOs—on the face of it, a potentially very positive development—is likely to lead to serious problems.