|

Young Offenders

24 February 2009

Mr. Humfrey Malins (Woking) (Con): As always in these debates, I begin by declaring an interest as a lawyer by background, a part-time district judge and a Crown court recorder. I hope tonight that I am speaking with some experience of the criminal justice system.
I want to focus on some problem areas and, I think, some solutions. One day 10 or 12 years ago when I was visiting a young offenders institution—in Kent, I think it was—I met a 19-year-old young man, in a cell, looking depressed, tired and drawn. Incidentally, he spent 17 hours a day banged up in his cell. I asked him what he was doing there and he said, "I am here for driving while disqualified." "What's the problem?" I said, "Are you a bad driver? Do you speed? Do you drive dangerously? Do you nick cars? What on earth is wrong with your driving?" "Nothing's wrong," he said, "My driving is good. I'm perfectly okay, but I don't have a driving licence so I get disqualified." "So," I said, "Get a driving licence." It was not unreasonable of me to say that. "But I can't," he said. I asked why not and he replied, "Because I would have to take the theory test." "What's the problem with the theory test?" I said. "I can't pass it, because I can't read and write." That got me thinking—and I have thought ever since—about the link between crime and literacy.
That is the link for young children from some of the worst sink estates in London and elsewhere. At school, they get behind and begin to fail. Then, because they fail, they cannot keep up with their peers and get angry and bad-tempered. When things go wrong, they are excluded because of their poor performance, and they are out on the streets, where they commit crimes, which leads to their being locked up. There is a link between levels of literacy and school exclusions, and between school exclusions and crime.
My thoughts have been backed up by an inspectorate of prisons report, which said that some 83 per cent. of boys under 18 in custody had been excluded from school. An even more astonishing figure was given to me by the Ministry of Justice: 52 per cent.of young
24 Feb 2009 : Column 199
men in custody—boys up to the age of 21—had been permanently excluded from school. There is surely a link—I hope that the House will understand this—between literacy and numeracy, school exclusions and crime.
I want to focus for a few minutes on the young offender estate—the prison estate that holds youngsters aged from 13 to 21—and to tell the House a little about my experiences. I talk to many people who work in the young offender estate and ask about the levels of literacy among the boys who arrive at the ages of 13, 14, 15 and 16. One senior official told me that in his judgment, which is backed by many others at that young offenders institution, more than 80 per cent. of the youngsters admitted at the age of 15 had the literacy and numeracy level of an eight-year-old or of someone even younger. What the devil does that mean? It means that there are 15 and 16-year-old boys who basically cannot read or write. They cannot cope, and that has led to frustration and anger. I am not saying that that covers the whole scene, but it is a problem and it greatly troubles the young offender estate.
What value for money do we get from our young offender estate? What does it cost? The average cost of putting a youngster into the young offender prison estate is £33,000 a year. That is what it costs us. In Feltham A and Feltham B, which are the two young offenders institutions in Feltham, it costs £42,000 for the year. That is a lot of money, and what do we get in value for money? What about the reoffending rates? They are absolutely mind-boggling. Official Government figures show that 16 and 17-year-olds who are released from custody have, respectively, an 80 and 70 per cent. chance of reoffending within a year of release.
David T.C. Davies: My hon. Friend is making a powerful point, but should we not take into account the cost of that reoffending? Would it not often be cheaper, in simple financial terms, to keep somebody in Feltham at £33,000 than to have them committing one offence after another on the streets of London?
Mr. Malins: I will to come on to that. Value for money, for me, means that people come out of Feltham, or anywhere else, and do not reoffend. That, I think, is what will save money.
Worse still, Government figures show that the 80 per cent. of those released who reoffend within one year do so, on average, four times in that year. Given that people are caught only once in every eight crimes that they commit, nobody can doubt the fact that, in effect, those youngsters are coming out and committing 30 or 40 crimes in their first year. At a cost of £33,000 a year, that is failure on a grand scale.
What are my remedies and solutions, if any? I have a few, which I want to draw to the attention of the House, and the first relates to literacy and numeracy. When someone arrives at a young offenders institution, on day one—I do not mean month one; I mean day one—a complete assessment of their educational position hitherto and their achievements should be undertaken. If they have been statemented, a full copy of the statement, binding on the prison, should be provided, and the prison should act upon it. Straightaway after that, a plan for that individual offender should be drawn up, showing what he or she must achieve in their time in that young offenders institution.

24 Feb 2009 : Column 200
I wonder whether hon. Members know how many hours a week people in young offenders institutions spend on education. Would they think that it was six hours a day? Six hours a day spent in education would be fair enough. I will tell hon. Members the answer: Feltham, seven and a half hours a week; Glen Parva, five hours a week; Reading, five hours a week; Aylesbury, six hours a week; and Rochester, three and a half hours a week. Will someone tell me that that is good news? It is not.
What about being locked up in the cells? How long does one feel that it is a great idea to lock up a young man in a cell each day? Would six, eight, nine or 10 hours be right? Let us look at the figures; they are depressing. At Aylesbury, young people are locked up in the cells for 17 hours a day. That is horrific. What does it do? At Reading, they are locked up for 16.5 hours.
What about sport? I am old-fashioned, but I reckon that hon. Members on both sides of the House recognise the value of sport, activity and physical work. I do not just mean PE in a gymnasium. A lot of those young people are pushing iron all day, or half the day or for a couple of hours, and according to the powers that be, all that does is make them stronger, and they can run away faster. No, I am talking about sport, out on the field in the open air. I met a young man who had not seen daylight in four months at a young offenders institution. Where is the sport? How many hours are spent on sport—real sport, team sport and active sport? Does sport help to develop character? I think that it does. People in our young offender estate are doing two or three hours a week on average.
Perhaps I am a little fanciful when I say that the Duke of Edinburgh award scheme is terrific. It is my pet hobby. I met an employer who interviewed everyone who came to him who had done the DOE. It is not done enough—barely at all—at places such Feltham, Portland and other institutions. There have been only one or two bronze awards in the past six years, out of hundreds of young men going through the system.
Here is a revolutionary idea: I really believe that education—literacy and numeracy—is vital, which to me means that short sentences of six, eight or 10 weeks are a waste of time. We cannot do anything with a youngster in that period. All the judges whom I have spoken to say, "For goodness' sake, put them away for nine months, because then you can make some real advances. If a crime is not serious enough for nine months inside, don't bother. Don't faff around"—I am not sure how Hansard will take that word—"with six weeks, because it's a revolving door; they are straight out, having laid low, and they come out no better."
Mr. Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con): Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the other barriers to the prevention of young offenders reoffending is the fact that about a third of them have been through the care system and that there is no statutory requirement for a social worker to visit them while they are in custody, to try to work with them towards a package of rehabilitation, to ensure that they do not reoffend when they come out and find themselves back where they started?
Mr. Malins: My hon. Friend makes a valid point and anticipates a subject that I shall come to in my closing words. He is right.

24 Feb 2009 : Column 201
In our young offenders institutions, we must focus on literacy and numeracy, but what else? Here is my nuts-and-bolts idea: in the last quarter of the sentence, all youngsters should be moved into a specific resettlement wing. What will happen then? The family will get more involved. Huge amounts of work will be done to arrange housing on release. It is no good leaving a young offenders institution in Surrey and being sent off to bed and breakfast in Slough at the age of 16. What is going on? Resettlement is the name of the game, coupled with the absolute requirement of going into a job. Education on release, housing on release, job on release—those are the things.
I went to Oakhill young offenders institution, where not one of the youngsters—both boys and girls aged 15, 16 and 17—who had done hairdressing had reoffended after two years of leaving. Oh yes, we can lock them up for ever if we want, but let us get the children literate, get them numerate, get them adding up and subtracting, get them to have a bit of pride, get them fit and well and give them a purpose. Let us give them a little remission, but it should be based on positive, excellent behaviour and real achievement, not just on sitting on their backsides or joining a gang. Let us focus on resettling them into the community, not back where they came from, but into a job or education. Let us put money into that. If we put money into it, we will save quite a lot of money in the long term, and we will be doing absolutely the right thing.