Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

My Lords, the point just made by the noble Baroness is very important. I am sure that my noble friend would have all possible support if he were to pursue it with those who carry mainstream responsibility. It is not an abstract theory, but follows the example of some countries that have successfully taken that road. I thank the Minister for his reply, to which I listened carefully. I also thank all the noble Lords who have associated themselves with and spoken to my amendment tonight. I am aware that it was a Duke from the other side of the Pennines from where I live who marched his troops to the top of the hill and then marched them down again. I am always determined to demonstrate from our side of the Pennines that we are made of tougher stuff. It seems that my noble friend has left certain doors ajar if not open. We should be working on that. I hope that when we are discussing these matters at Report stage of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill we will get as positive and sensitive a response as we have had from my noble friend. That is terribly important. I have a couple of observations to make. First, on the prison estate, we must consider carefully that if we had nothing and were starting from scratch with a purpose-built estate, we would produce what is needed at less cost and more effectively. The trouble is that we are using a lot of money in constantly trying to patch up a system that is not designed for the purpose. At some point we must wrest ourselves free of this treadmill and say that it is insane and that we must have a new strategic approach. Secondly, when I served on the Joint Committee on Human Rights, and we were discussing deaths in custody, we encountered exactly the kind of highly professional, dedicated, imaginative, caring prison officers to whom the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, referred. They would get angry with us parliamentarians as ask, ““What are you trying to get us to do? You are trying to get us to do jobs for which we are not professionally trained or properly equipped in premises that are not right, and are making a bad situation worse. Instead of improving it, we are contributing to the deterioration, and we are very angry about that””. They are good people to whom we should listen. I spent nine years as honorary president of the YMCA in England. Some of the work that I admired the most, done by a very fine crowd of people who were in the front line of social action, was that going on in prisons and detention centres. The stories that were told to friends in the YMCA, and which I was told when I made visits there, are a challenge to every Member of this House. Some of the experiences that the young people who became offenders had been through were horrific. In some cases it would have been an absolute miracle had they not shown delinquent behaviour of one form or another. That is a challenge to us all. Sometimes it is said that it is soft or wet to talk about the social conditioning of these youngsters and their experiences, and that we should be tough with them and then things will come right. All the evidence is that the tough thing to do is to take those realities into account and to recognise that many of these youngsters have never been loved or cared for in their lives. We talked about that in more specific detail at earlier stages of the Bill. I welcome my noble friend’s endeavour to leave the door ajar. It is right to say that the Minister probably sympathises 99.9 per cent with all we are saying but does not have the deciding influence in some of these key areas. We encourage him to speak in our name in the deliberations to which he is a party. We will work at opening the door that is ajar but at this stage, without, I hope, becoming the Duke of York, I consider that is appropriate to beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendment No. 30 not moved.]