My Lords, this probing amendment from the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, would require the courts to impose a sentence with the requirement to attend a residential rehabilitation unit where the offender has a drug or alcohol addiction, unless they had been convicted of murder, manslaughter, a terrorism offence, or a sexual offence. So, we are dealing here with the position at sentence. I will come to my noble friend Lord Attlee’s point about drugs in prison, although that is a slightly different, albeit related, point from that raised by the amendment.
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I recognise the noble and learned Baroness’s intention to address the drug or alcohol—sometimes drug and alcohol—misuse problems that may be at the heart of the offending. I reassure her and the Committee that there are already ways in which we are doing this, and I will say something about that, but I am concerned that this approach would unduly restrict sentencers and remove some decision-making powers from them. When deciding what sentences to impose, the courts obviously have to take into account the circumstances of the offence and any aggravating or mitigating factors, in line with the sentencing guidelines from the Sentencing Council.
At the moment, community sentence treatment requirements can already be imposed by the court as part of a community order or suspended sentence order. They can include drug rehabilitation requirements, alcohol treatment requirements and mental health treatment requirements. Any magistrates at court, as we have heard, or Crown Court can already impose a drug rehabilitation requirement or alcohol treatment requirement as part of a community order or suspended sentence order, where that is recommended by probation and where the court is satisfied that the offender is suitable for treatment, arrangements have been made for treatment, and importantly—I will come back to this—the offender has consented to the treatment. The treatment would take place under the supervision of the probation service.
As the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, pointed out, consent is a vital component in any treatment requirement. A court can enforce residential provision at the recommendation of probation, but we are clear that a court cannot, and, I suggest, should not, force an offender to undergo a treatment programme, because consent is essential. Even when an offender consents to treatment, the Committee will be aware that residential treatment placements are unfortunately scarce, expensive and in high demand from substance misuse services in the general community as well as those in the criminal justice system.
We have to give priority for places to those who have demonstrated a sustained and successful commitment to their sobriety or a drug-free life, which can be hard to establish ahead of sentencing. Also, those who are offered a place in many cases have to be prepared to travel to locations far from home, which would, in the case of offenders, disrupt essential case management by probation. Demand for community drug and alcohol services is high. We are rolling out £80 million in drug treatment funding with colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care, which will include funding to ensure that prison leavers and those who have been given community sentences with treatment requirements can access the services they need.
I hope that I have set out a response to the noble and learned Baroness’s amendment. My noble friend Lord Attlee started off by asking how he could most easily obtain drugs; in response, I have to say that there are some limits to the assistance that Ministers can provide to Members of the House. However, so far as drugs in prison are concerned—I will not take too much time on this—while there are urine tests for
people going into prison and we have scanners, searches and increasingly sophisticated chemical tests, I recognise that there is still a problem. With respect, though, that is a separate point, and therefore I will not say any more about it now. I hope that I have addressed the noble and learned Baroness’s amendment, which I invite her to withdraw.