My Lords, Amendment 19A stands on its own. I should first apologise to the House for not being present for Second Reading. As this is the first time that I have taken part in this Bill I should, in line with the Code of Conduct, declare various interests that I know are going to come up. I am a member of Pendle Borough Council and its executive and vice-president of the Local Government Association. I am also a member and vice-president of the Open Spaces Society and a member and patron of the British Mountaineering Council. I will declare any other interests as they crop up.
The amendment is unusual for a first amendment on a Bill because it deals with a specific point rather than a general one that might lead to some general discussions, but there are amendments that are coming up fairly quickly where those general discussions can take place on the principles behind this part of the Bill. We are talking about the proposal to abolish ASBOs and introduce injunctions for the prevention of nuisance and annoyance. The proposal is that injunctions of this nature can be taken out against people from the age of 10 upwards. There was some discussion at Second Reading, which I read with great interest, about whether the age of 10 was appropriate or whether it was too low. The amendment provides an opportunity for some probing and consideration of that at this stage of the Bill.
It occurred to me that it might be useful to look at my party's policy on this matter. That could be a fairly original thing for someone in your Lordships’ House to do, but in any case I thought that it might be helpful. I discovered that we had agreed a policy paper within the past two years, Taking Responsibility: Policies on Youth Justice. Under the heading “More appropriate treatment of Young People in the Justice System”, it talked about the age of criminal responsibility. These are civil injunctions so, unlike ASBOs, they are not part of the criminal system—although as noble Lords pointed out at Second Reading, any young people involved in the system might not recognise a great deal of difference between the two.
The policy states:
“Liberal Democrats recognise that children aged under 14 often know the difference between right and wrong and have personal responsibility for their actions but that courts are not the appropriate way to deal with them”.
We are not talking about the wider youth justice system: we are dealing with what is in front of us. The paper went on to suggest that it would be better if there were specially trained panels to deal with young people of this age, similar to those in Scotland,
“with the emphasis on measures including restorative justice”,
and community sentencing. It continues:
“Panels would be expected to provide consequences which were proportionate, sought to reduce reoffending and provide amends to the victim as well as addressing any welfare needs the child had”.
They would also mean that,
“immature acts of youth do not result in a lifelong criminal record”.
Some of the principles behind this are embodied in the idea that the injunctions for the prevention of nuisance and annoyance—IPNAs, as I suppose we will have to call them—will bring in. The document went on to talk about the age of criminal responsibility across Europe, which varies, although the UK currently has the lowest ages in western Europe—10 in England and Wales and, at that time, eight in Scotland, although there is now new legislation in Scotland.
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We need to protect our children from making mistakes and should not expect vulnerable children to make judgments and decisions that many adults struggle with. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has recommended that the age of criminal responsibility in England and Wales should be raised to at least 12, and Liberal Democrats believe that it should be raised to 14. That is our party policy. We are looking at the proposals for the new IPNAs with that background, particularly where ASBOs have not been terribly successful. This paper points out that the breach rate for teenagers has been over 60%, and I believe that it is now around 68%. Clearly this policy is working neither for the young people involved nor for the local communities. If people go back and breach their ASBOs, the anti-social behaviour is not being adequately dealt with. The paper suggests:
“Other unacceptable behaviour should be tackled through positive measures such as Parental Control Agreements and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts (ABCs) which specify the new behaviour which is required. This is an approach which works”.
I am aware that the Government intend this to happen, and that there should be a series of actions that take place in relation to unruly young people and to those who go over the border into criminal activity, and that to deal with a problem an injunction should not be slapped on straightaway. There should be a series of preventive actions and interventions, working with the parents and attempting to get successful acceptable behaviour contracts. These work much better than ASBOs do at the moment, when you get to ASBOs. In too many places ASBOs have been taken as a quick means of dealing with problems. The direction of thinking and government policy is to be applauded. Later on, there are amendments down about resources. Whether there will be the resources there to see it through everywhere is a different matter, but I am not dealing with that at the moment.
My amendment puts forward a compromise suggestion. It takes the view that these injunctions ought not to be used for children at primary school. The age of 12 means that by the time they have got to secondary school and moved up a stage into the more adult world the injunctions can be used. Below that, while they are still at primary school, they are possibly not appropriate. This is clearly a judgment, but I put this amendment forward as a means of probing what the Government intend for these very young children and presenting the opportunity for debate in Committee this afternoon. I beg to move.