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STATES OF JERSEY
Health, Social Security and Housing
The Coordination of Services for Vulnerable Children Sub-Panel
Clarification and amendments proposed by the witnesses are in blue ink.
WEDNESDAY, 22nd APRIL 2009
Panel:
Senator A. Breckon (Chairman) Deputy G.P. Southern of St. Helier Deputy T.M. Pitman of St. Helier
Witnesses:
Senator B.I. Le Marquand (The Minister for Home Affairs) Deputy J.A. Hilton of St. Helier
Mr. B. Taylor (Acting Deputy Chief of Police)
Ms. C. Davison (Public Protection Unit)
Senator A. Breckon (Chairman):
Thanks for coming at such short notice, we had some things planned for yesterday that did not happen. You are probably aware of the process and procedures. The title of the review is the Coordination of Services for Vulnerable Children, so it is not specifically about Williamson, it is a bit wider than that, and we are under some time constraints as well, so thank you for coming today. My name is Alan Breckon, I am the Chairman of this sub-panel. The other members are Deputy Trevor Pitman, who is the Deputy Chairman, and Deputy Geoff Southern . Roy Le Hérissier gives his apologies, he had to leave to go somewhere else, but he will be back but we are not sure about the timing of that. Thanks for coming. Can I ask you, Minister, if you would just introduce yourself and your colleagues for the benefit of the tape.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand (The Minister for Home Affairs):
Yes, I will do that, I am Senator Ian Le Marquand, I am currently the Minister for Home Affairs. To my right is Mr. Barry Taylor , who is currently the Acting Deputy Chief Officer. He is currently the number 3 officer in the police, but acting as number 2. He is here on a temporary appointment and he is here today because the Acting Chief Officer is having some well deserved holiday, having had virtually none for months. Beyond him is a lady whose name I cannot remember but who is from the Public Protection Unit.
Ms. C. Davison (Public Protection Unit):
I am Detective Sergeant Cathy Davison. I work in the Public Protection Unit, which covers child protection.
On my left, of course, is my excellent Assistant Minister, Deputy Jacqui Hilton.
Senator A. Breckon:
Thank you. The process is we are recording this, really this is for our own benefit. Although it is fairly relaxed it is on the public record and you will be given a copy of this. The reason for that is if you say "60" and it should have been "16" you will be given an opportunity to correct any factual inaccuracies, and for my benefit they take out the ums and ahs and whatever else when they do it.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
That is fine, I am familiar with that because I have appeared before Scrutiny on 3 occasions already.
Senator A. Breckon:
Thanks for that. You probably caught at the end, some of the exchange that we have just had with Health and Social Services, and the reason we have asked for that is there is some duty under the law for police and others, so that is why we have the combination that we have asked for. With the questions, Minister, Assistant Minister, and your officers, if there is anything that you feel that you wish to say, please feel free to do that. The questions are not aimed specifically at anybody. If you feel it is too political then it is to your left, and if there is anything operational then it is that way as well. But the other thing I should say for your information is on Monday we did visit Greenfields, we visited H.M. (Her Majesty's) Prison La Moye, young offenders, we went to the female wing and we did see some of the ... discussion with the governors and some of the senior members there, some of the operational issues, and that has raised a number of questions for us, which we might well come to you with today. But I would like to start perhaps with what maybe is in the law but perhaps an operational matter, Minister, and again it is up to you how you deal with this. Under the law there is requirements of the police if there is children involved, this is under Article 41, and it is the police protection issue, and there are perhaps 2 issues there, which I would like to mention. One is if officers attend an incident and there is a disturbance or something like that and there are children in the premises, then how is that dealt with. If you are taking away people into perhaps custody and the children are there, how are they dealt with? The second issue is if children themselves - we are drawing a line at 18 here - are taken into custody for perhaps a disturbance or whatever it may be, what is the process for dealing with that for informing others that has happened, whether they are parents, whether they are in care, or what the situation is, and I do not know if you want to lead on that or if you want to ...
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I am going to pass those to Mr. Taylor because they are more technical. I have some general understanding, but he will have more detail.
Mr. B. Taylor (Acting Deputy Chief of Police):
Thank you, Minister. Thank you, gentlemen. Certainly, covering the first point, police can be called to any sort of incident, really a variety of incidents, and, should there be children present, then obviously we have to make an assessment as to the involvement of the children or their welfare, perhaps it is a call for a domestic dispute or something. If there is concern about the wellbeing of the child or children who are there, I suppose the acid test is, is there a significant risk to those children at that particular time? Have they been involved in some way, shape or form? The officers would have to make an assessment around that and if they feel that there is some degree of risk then they would call for a supervisor to attend as well, and a joint assessment and a joint decision would be made. If it is necessary to remove the child from that risk, then the duty officer, I think it is the designated officer who is referred to within the law and within the policy that attends that law, but the duty officer would then make a decision to take a person into custody or a place of safety, as it were, police protection, and police protection would be sought. Immediately that is triggered - and that is a judgment call really in many respects, it is a
subjective issue - there would be immediate contact with Social Services, Children's Services, and if it is out of hours the duty social worker would be called and would attend, and there would be a joint approach then to dealing with those children's welfare. It may be that they would then be taken to another place, away from the home, or ideally, if the children are old enough, their views would be sought as to how we perhaps best deal with this. There may be relatives they could go to, there may be friends or neighbours who would be prepared to help, or other than that the Social Services would perhaps intervene and perhaps look at foster care or maybe residential care, or it may be a voluntary submission to the Social Services in that we can deal with the children in a different way. If we go to an incident and perhaps someone has offended, a fight or whatever it might be, and their parent or their guardian has to be removed, shall we say, then of course the welfare of the children still has to be attended to. It may well be they are not in significant harm, they just happen to be there while something else has happened perhaps, and again an assessment will be made. That probably would not involve Social Services necessarily at that stage, because we are dealing with somebody else as an offender, but the welfare of those children would be paramount, and if we could, say there was a voluntary referral, by the parent, to a friend or neighbour, deal with it that way, or otherwise we would have to engage the Social Services or Children's Services to deal with their welfare in a similar sort of way.
Senator A. Breckon:
Do you draw the line there at 16 or 18; where is the sort of line?
Ms. C. Davison:
Seventeen tends to be the line.
Senator A. Breckon:
What would be the situation with a young person who offended? What would be the process of informing carers, parents, whatever? Say they were not at home, if it was out on the streets?
Mr. B. Taylor :
The framework for dealing with people who are arrested or taken into custody is effectively the P.P.A.C.E. (Police Processes and Criminal Evidence) Act, and automatically there is a right of notification. If a person is a juvenile then their parent or their guardian ad litem, if they were in care it would be the authorities, would be told and an appropriate adult would attend, they would have to attend and look after the welfare of that child. If a person is in care, it may be considered appropriate by the care authorities to notify the child's parents or guardians as well, but that is an automatic right and that is undertaken immediately.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can I call them "police on the beat", are they all aware of the process if they come across this situation, so they know that this is plan B and that happens?
Mr. B. Taylor :
Yes, that is instilled during training, and there are refresher inputs in relation to that. It is a very good piece of legislation, I must say. The process is relatively straightforward, it is rather subjective, it is a judgment call, but at the end of the day the judgment is really to protect the child and to make sure that the welfare of that child is best looked after.
Senator A. Breckon:
Is there any independent test on that? Supposing you could not get the parent or someone like that, is there anybody to represent ... you might take a view on what should happen to the child, but the child might ... like you say, you consult it, but there is no advocacy service as such, is there, or is there?
Mr. B. Taylor :
For a child who is in custody, who may have offended? We would try to seek legal advice for a child if that is appropriate, but again it would be through the parent, guardian ad litem, or the care authorities, who would assist in that regard.
Deputy T.M. Pitman of St. Helier :
Just one point, which is related. Could you just clarify anecdotal stories of young people perhaps being in the back of a police van for hours at a time because there is nowhere to take them suitable? Could you clarify, is that a reality?
Mr. B. Taylor :
I am not sure, to be honest. I have not been here long and I would be guessing if I gave an answer to that. But I think what I have become aware of recently, since my time here, is that there does seem to be a shortage of secure accommodation on the Island and all concerned, all the agencies involved in this particular area of work are stretched rather when we do have issues involving a large number of children. This can go in peaks and troughs. To be honest, there has been a fair degree of activity over recent weeks where we have children in town or offending in town, whatever, and they have been dealt with promptly, and again it has been a multi-agency approach. There is very good dialogue and action between the various authorities, but often it is difficult when we have to deal with children within the framework of the law, again looking after their welfare, whether they are offender or not, sometimes there are not opportunities to actually take that person into perhaps a secure accommodation. Again, fostering is an approach that is used quite often for those cases.
Senator B. I. Le Marquand:
Can I just comment that, alongside what Mr. Taylor is saying, of course, are decisions which have to be made in relation to young people who offended as to whether they should be released on bail or not, and that whole system will run in parallel and obviously decisions have to be made as to whether to charge them straight away or not, but if they are charged then decisions have to be made in relation to bail. Those decisions would normally be made by a Centenier initially and not by the States of Jersey Police, once the child is charged. So, instead of talking about the welfare aspects, it would be the enforcement aspects run in parallel with those. But there are various different rights, and one of the matters I had to look at when I was a magistrate was how well the system was operating in relation to a suitable adult being present when youngsters were being interviewed, and in fact we discovered that it was not working properly at all. I believe that has now been corrected as a result of the decisions that I and my colleagues made on that particular case.
Senator A. Breckon: What was going on?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
The problem was that a suitable adult was being called in, but it was a lovely little old lady who was very sweet but had no idea what her duties were. She had attended about 200 times. We asked her whether she had ever had cause to intervene during the course of a youngster being interviewed under caution and she said: "Oh no, the police always treat them most appropriately", and it was quite clear she did not have a clue that she had a responsibility to decide whether she should be advising them to say nothing, or things of that nature. I believe that has now been corrected, but that was somewhat alarming.
Ms. C. Davison:
That is right, that has been changed, because now when we interview people on tape we explain on tape what the role of the appropriate adult is and make sure they clearly understand what their role is in that room. That has been addressed since then.
Senator A. Breckon:
Geoff wants to ask a question, but there may well be operational matters, and, as I said at the start, if there is anything at all, feel free to accept the questions to whoever.
Deputy G.P. Southern of St. Helier :
Yes, it is very open, really, it is to get the Minister talking about the political implications and the implications directly of Williamson for his department. What are the priorities you see coming out of the Williamson review as a Minister, in terms of action?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Our department was always the junior partner in relation to this, because although the corporate parent was set up with 3 Ministers, in reality the lead work is done either by Health and Social Services for the Children's Office or by Education and, of course, Education also run Greenfields. So the role of the Home Affairs Department was really linked in by the criminal justice system in terms of involvement of the police, in terms of sentencing to the Young Offenders Institution and things of that nature. There are other minor spin-offs and obviously co-ordination between departments as well. I am particularly concerned, and have been concerned for a very long time, in relation to issues to do with accommodation for young people, and particularly sentencing issues, and I have been on the record for a very long time, going back to my days of magistrate, concerns in 2 particular areas; one of which is referred to in Williamson, and that is the problem that we have at the Young Offenders Institution, people from an age group of 15 up until 20 or beyond 20 if they are completing their sentence. This is much too wide an age group and it is very clear that we need to get, at least the 15 and 16 year-olds out of the Young Offenders Institution and presumably into Greenfields. But there are technical problems with this which I explained to my own Scrutiny Panel in the past which is slowing the process up. The technical problems are very simply this; that we have one institution, Greenfields, which currently fulfils 2 operations. One is it acts as a remand centre for those from 10 up until school leaving age and, secondly, it is also acts as a place where youngsters are placed under a secure placement order, which is an order made by the Royal Court, a type of civil order where they need to be placed somewhere for their own safety, et cetera. So you already have a mixture of those who are on remand from a criminal system and those who are there on a civil placement. If we then add ...
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Define for me, treat me as if I am new to it - I am - define for me the difference between those 2 groups of people.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: You want me to explain that?
Deputy G.P. Southern : Yes, please.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
One group of people, children who essentially are in need and who have been placed there because they have run away from children's homes, because they represent a danger to themselves, because there are welfare issues; that kind of route. The other is a group of youngsters who are in the criminal justice system and who have been remanded in custody normally because of the risk of further serious offending. That is the normal main test the judges will apply. So you have got a mixture of those that come in by a criminal route and those by a civil route. Now, in practice, they may well be the same
people at different times, but they are not always the same people and theoretically it is not good to be mixing the 2 together. If you then add to that mix a third group, namely those who are serving a criminal sentence, it makes it even worse and that is the technical problem that we have been wrestling with. The Attorney General wrote letters, I believe, about a year, 18 months ago, to the U.K. (United Kingdom) to try and see whether, if we went ahead with adding this third group, whether we would run into problems in terms of the Privy Council approving it. I saw recent correspondence from him showing he has not had a reply. So this has been blocking that, which is really, really frustrating, because no matter what the theoretical position there are issues under the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, and of course there are also issues in relation to human rights. But the really frustrating thing is that the choice is really between young people, 15 to 16, going to an institution where they are going to mix with much older people, obviously totally unsuitable, or be placed with other people who are of a younger age group, but then that mixes up the 3 categories.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Is there also a problem with the size of Greenfields if you start ... it sounds to me like you are about to put a quart into a pint pot?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: Sorry, I am not quite with you?
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Is there also a problem with the size of Greenfields? We are talking a unit, 8 people. Sounds like a quart in a pint pot.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
At the moment, yes. I mean, I took over responsibility for the Youth Court in 2001 and that was the most difficult year the Youth Court ever experienced. The old system broke basically because of the sheer volume of youngsters who were causing difficulties. I kept my own statistics and tracked year groups to see how they behaved and what was happening to see if there were patterns I could understand, and there was a very clear pattern that came out of that. The difficulty is that the volume of youth crime, particularly in relation to those who are under 15, in relation to them there was a particular issue which I would like to mention, which is not mentioned in Williams, which is a nettle which needs to be grafted at some point in some way. But the volume of them fluctuates wildly and we went through a situation of almost alternating years in which one year group would cause major problems, the next one would not, the next one would, the next one would not. 2001, 2003, 2005 were bad years in terms of the key issue which is year 10 and year 9, those who are just under 15 and who are repeat repeat offending. Then we ran into 3 consecutive quiet years, 2006, 2007, 2008, and things were just starting to warm up, as it were, when I left, in the middle of 2008. Now we seem to be into a situation where suddenly there is an increase of youngsters in this number. The result of this in simple terms is for long periods in 2008 there was only one person, a maximum of one person in Greenfields, and overnight it went to 9 whereas the actual number it is meant to take is 8, and numbers have remained very high ever since. So we have this situation where you can have wild and rapid fluctuations in numbers. There is a difficulty, and this is one of the concerns that I have got, and I know Deputy Hilton shares this, there is a difficulty at times if you get a big increase in numbers and there being sufficient suitable accommodation, because you have only got 8 places at Greenfields, 8 secure places, we have got children's homes which are not secure and so you get a pattern of youngsters being remanded back to the children's homes because their parents cannot control them, run away from the children's homes, police having to go and search for them repeatedly, reoffending while they are doing that, coming back before the courts. It is a major issue. When the proposals were put together at the end of last year the numbers seemed fine. We had very quiet numbers. Suddenly we have gone from very quiet numbers to a situation where there is constantly about 8 or more in Greenfields.
Is that also a reflection of the courts greater or lesser use of the facility? Or awareness of and willingness to use that facility?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
That is possible. I cannot be sure about that. I mean you must understand that the Magistrates Court suffered a serious setback last year because whereas I was due to retire at the end of June and was an experienced magistrate in dealing with youth matters and my colleague, Ian Christmas, was going to carry on. He then effectively, for reasons which are well known, ceased to be able to function and still is not able to function because of a pending investigation. So suddenly overnight the Youth Court lost their 2 experienced magistrates dealing with youth matters. If you bring in inexperienced magistrates, which had to happen because there was no one else to do it, they do not have the same confidence to know when they should remand in custody and when they should not remand in custody. There is a danger, particularly in early stages, that perhaps they have become a bit too defensive, that maybe they may be more willing to remand. That may have happened, I cannot say it has. On the other hand, it can go either way. Either they can be too willing to remand or they can be not willing enough to remand.
The decisions can go wrong on both directions but there is no doubt whatsoever there were difficulties at the court simply by the 2 most experienced magistrates in chairing youth panels going at the same time. The court lost a lot of expertise.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Assistant Minister, would you like to come in on that? You may want to say something slightly different.
Deputy J.A. Hilton of St. Helier :
I have become aware very recently that there is indeed an issue with a particular group of young individuals. It has been well documented in the Jersey Evening Post about groups of individuals being arrested. I am well aware that I think probably since last summer that we have a situation where this group of individuals are offending repeatedly and certainly last week I became aware when children were arrested at Heathfield because they were causing a disturbance and the police were called to that disturbance and they were arrested. Four were remanded back to Heathfield, and my understanding is that the police were requiring a custodial remand for 2 of them but were told by Greenfields they could only take one. So, one was remanded and one was released, and the individual who was released went on to basically, within hours of being released, breached his curfew, because he was on a curfew, disappeared all night, was allowed to ... my understanding is he was allowed to remain at large, I understand, because he was due to spend the following evening with his mother, which I believe he failed to do so, and was arrested on the Friday morning attempting or being involved in a theft of some sort of motor vehicle. Certainly, from my experience, I would have thought ... and certainly from what I am told the history of this young offender, he should have been in Greenfields on Wednesday for his own protection and the protection of the public, so I think there is an issue there. There is an even bigger issue, I believe, in that Heathfield and La Preference, maybe more so Heathfield, you have got this group of individuals mixing with much younger children in care, maybe 10 or 11 years old who are there through no fault of their own, who are being influenced by these kids who are basically running out of control, and that has got to be a matter of grave concern for everybody involved in child protection.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Can I take that on? Greenfields was supposed to be part of the solution to this, which has been a long term issue in the small community like Jersey, and it is obviously not necessarily meeting the full need. Over to the Minister; where do you go next?
It is a question of numbers. I mean when Greenfields was being designed and so on, and we were aware of the numbers that were going into there, the sort of numbers that were being planned for were a great deal lower than the numbers which had existed previously in terms of Les Chênes, the premises which were not fully secure from which people were constantly escaping, which preceded. So we knew that there was a risk element in terms of the sizing of that but because we had these 3 consecutive quiet years I am referring to the problem never materialised. Now suddenly we seem to have a bad year in terms of repetitive offending from a particular age group that the whole system is under pressure. This is very, very difficult. Very difficult to plan for.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
I accept it is very difficult.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Because if you had been asking me these questions 6 months ago you might have been saying: "Well, why on earth did we waste £X million building an 8-bedded unit at Greenfields which is never used?" Suddenly we are the other way. Now, in addition to that, there is an issue that we are concerned with in terms of the plans of the Children's Service to reduce the overall size and capacity of the children's homes because, if I have got my arithmetic right, they intend to reduce to a totality of 15 places, 8 of which would be at Greenfields.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
No, that is in a different complex.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: I am sorry, 8 in addition.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
I do not think we are going that small.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: I am corrected.
Deputy G.P. Southern : Would that they could.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Fifteen plus 8 but that is much, much lower numbers than historically. Now I understand the aim but it is entirely dependent upon 2 factors. Firstly, getting suitable professional or semi-professional fosterers who will be able to deal with this, an aim which I have long supported, and secondly, it is dependent upon what is happening. What Deputy Hilton has highlighted there is the problem that we had for a long time when accommodation was full that you start then taking youngsters who ideally would be in secure accommodation because of the risk of reoffending and you put them back into the general children's home system where they start to enrol other youngsters to go and join them on their offending sprees and start to bring others into the loop of offending.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
It is a matter of great concern to me.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
I accept and I empathise with the problem you face there but I still would come back to the question and the way forward, as you see it, is; what is your thinking?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
There is another issue I have to throw into the pot.
Deputy G.P. Southern : What is the way forward?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Just to complicate the issue, there is another issue that I have to throw into the pot, and that is that one of the problems that the courts faced in the whole of the period from 2001 onwards, which I was very vocal about from the magistrate's chair and very critical of the Committee Presidents and Ministers involved at that time, was that the courts had no enforceable sentencing powers in relation to those aged under 15. Now this led to a situation in which if youngsters refuse to do probation, if they refuse to sign a piece of paper to be bound over, when it came to sentencing for the under-15s, the court had no powers. You could fine them, but if they did not pay the fine you could not imprison them, you could not put them on community service, you could not make them agree to do probation, you have no enforceable powers, barring wholly exceptional situation of very serious offences which would normally carry a 14- year sentence in the U.K. In other words, something really, really serious. This created a situation in which the courts during the difficult years, when we had an outbreak of serious problems among the under-15s, would be seeing youngsters offend, would be remanding them in custody for a period because the court knew otherwise they would go out and offend again, which put their lives at risk and of course the general public and so on, but when we came to sentencing we had to let them out again knowing that they were going to come back again. In one year I think I had a girl who appeared - I lose track of the numbers - something like 10 times for sentencing in the same year, 10 different occasions so prolific was her offending and going round the cycle. Now, my preferred solution to this, because I have come from a criminal justice background, historically has been to give the courts a power of sentencing in relation to 12 to 14 year-olds to Greenfields in relation to a specific type of special order, which would have an element of period during which they would be held in custody and an element of period during which they would be on a kind of probation. There is some political resistance to that because people do not like the idea of people so young as that, as it were, being locked up in relation to a criminal matter. So there are possible alternatives. The alternative which was produced was in fact the civil order that I am referring to, but that has never worked properly in relation to the category case that I am talking about. The reason it has not worked properly is because the law as drafted contains a welfare test which has been interpreted by courts, probably because of the way it is drafted, as meaning that you could only place people at Greenfields on a civil order if there was a welfare issue in terms of them running away from home or things of that nature. My contention, my longstanding contention, is this: if it is not in the interest of the child to allow them to continue in a cycle of offending, which is basically corrupting themselves and building up a cycle of behaviour which subsequently they will find very difficult to break, there is the nub of the problem in relation to the existing civil order that it actually does not deal with that type of case. So I accept that there are possibly 2 routes by which we can try to deal with this. One is by the criminal route I have long opposed. The alternative would be by re-writing the civil route so it clearly included the ability of the Royal Court to make an order placing a youngster at Greenfields in the sort of category case I am talking about of repeat repeat offending. Because if we cannot do that then we have this hopeless cycle of offending, being remanded in custody for a period, being sentenced, being released, going out and reoffending, being remanded in custody for a period and so on and so forth. Now, that whole situation has gone quiet in recent years for the reasons I say because we had 3 consecutive quiet years. There were one or 2 people in that period who were getting into that sort of cycle. One of them was a youngster to whom Deputy Hilton has just referred. But there is a problem that has got to be addressed long term. We have got to grapple with that
particular problem and we have to grapple it for the good of the children apart from the point of view of protection.
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
Before the Minister started to answer that question I thought it would have been a good time to talk about the minimum age of criminal responsibility generally and look at that. Obviously reports have come out there is some disparity in thinking there and really ask for your thoughts on that issue.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
In general, in Europe, you have different types of systems which operate, but they all achieve ultimately, as I understand it, similar ends. The British system has tended to go for a lower age of criminal responsibility and then brought youngsters into the criminal justice system but has then run things in parallel so that in the U.K. ... for instance youngsters might be remanded in custody as part of the criminal process, or they might be placed in a secure children's home under some sort of welfare process. Those systems exist in parallel. In other parts of Europe, as I understand it, they primarily use a civil system but nevertheless they have youngsters with the same problems and they have to find appropriate ways of dealing with them. Our system is based upon the British system. The main route in, if you like, is by the criminal process and of course the advantages of that are the police officer can arrest people. They can arrest youngsters. If there is a gang of youngsters beating someone up somewhere in town they can go and they can arrest them immediately. They do not have to wait for some civil order to cut in. Now, no doubt there is probably some provision under European law which might parallel that but that is the way our system works. What was being proposed by the Howard League of decriminalising up to 14s or whatever, is a complete change to our system and would require us effectively to re-write our whole system. That would take a great deal of time and at the end of the day you still have to solve the same problems. You still have to meet the same needs. You still have to deal with the same situations. So I am fundamentally opposed to it for the very simple reason that it would make it even more difficult to cut across these cycles of behaviour and offending and to intervene early. That is why I am fundamentally opposed to the Howard League's recommendations.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
But you are saying we have got a system which is effectively a civil order as distinct from a criminal order.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
We have but it is not working properly.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
It needs tweaking to make it work properly.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
That is the alternative route. That is what I have started to focus on.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Now you are responsible for deciding what we are going to do to try and solve this problem. When are you likely to be making that decision and bringing something to the States?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
The civil order is not my responsibility alone because that would be a part of the Children's Law and would come back into Health and Social Services. What I realise is ... because my background is in the criminal justice system I naturally look for a solution within the criminal justice system because that is where my expertise and background are. But there may well be an alternative solution within the civil system provided it can be tweaked, and I am aware that there is likely to be less political opposition for such an approach simply because it is civil rather than criminal. But one way or another we have got to solve this problem and it has become urgent this year because we have had this sudden outbreak of problems among those aged under 15.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
The answer to my question: when are you likely to be considering it and when are you likely to be acting, whether on your own behalf or in conjunction with H.S.S. (Health and Social Services)?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I think a meeting has been set up.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
Considering in the short term how we are going to deal with this group of offenders?
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Not particularly this group but producing a solution which might mean that we do not see this 3 years down the line next time we get gang warfare in the streets. Bit too strong; kids running around the streets.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I know that Health and Social Services are trying to set up a meeting to discuss this very area. I am looking in vain in my diary to see if a date has been fixed, I do not think one has, but we need to get together to discuss this.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Which brings us down to the focus of what our Scrutiny Panel is about, is actually entitled the Co- ordination of Services for Vulnerable People. Immediately I am seeing, right, we have got a problem co-ordinating a meeting between 2 departments over an issue.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
That is not entirely true. After I became aware last Wednesday about what had been going with this particular group of youngsters that created a lot of headlines in the paper, that was that lot of people, I spoke to our Chief Officer and asked him to arrange a meeting between the heads of Probation, Health, police and himself, which he did and they met on Monday. They met on Monday this week, so they had a meeting. This was just a short term solution to what was happening last week. So they did meet on Monday, and our Chief Officer is away in London today so it is a bit difficult because I only had a very brief discussion with him afterwards, and my understanding is that extra resources have been put into the Youth Offending Team and so they did have a discussion around how they were going to target these individuals who have been causing this problem recently. So, that is what we have done in the very, very media thing, but as the Minister has alluded to, we are meeting and I believe it is either 5th or 6th May.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
It is not in my diary. Thank you for that. I was aware of that meeting because Mr. Taylor showed me the minutes of that meeting when I arrived. So there was an officers-level meeting to co-ordinate things. But I am talking about changes of law and things of that nature, and that, I think is the 5th.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
It is either 5th or 6th May.
Okay, it is not in my diary yet but I knew it was about time.
Deputy G.P. Southern :
I am glad to hear that is relatively immediate.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
I mean we feel very, very strongly about it. I have got real concerns about Williamson. A lot of my concern is based around the reduction in numbers to 15 beds. When Williamson did his presentation and I asked him about that, because on the day that I asked him that question I think there were 29 children in care, and I have got real concern about these vulnerable children who are mixing with other kids who are in the criminal justice system and the way forward is professional foster parents, remand foster parents, fosters parents who have got the expertise to deal with children who have got real emotional issues, and that is the answer. But (a) are the resources there, and (b) what will we do if suddenly we have just got 2 6-bedded units, one 3-bedded units, suddenly we have an explosion again. So I have got real concern about the numbers and how it is being consolidated.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can I come back, Minister, to something you said earlier about the ... you touched on your experience of the Children's Executive and it was 3 Committee Presidents, as it was, coming together, now Ministers. Do you have any experience of how effective or ineffective that was?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I do not think it was very effective because I do not think it met very often. Someone produced a note of occasions on which the 3 Ministers did meet and I was interested to see one of them was in response to a letter from me in 2003 saying the roof was about to fall in on the system then. It just did not work. It is very difficult to co-ordinate to get 3 Ministers together to discuss things. This is why I believe that it must ... that Williamson is right; one Minister must take the lead and obviously that needs to be Health and Social Services. It cannot be us. But we obviously have a particular slant, as we see on this, because of the crime prevention aspect of it. The old system is too cumbersome. One Minister must take responsibility. We will sort our areas of responsibility, people will still be expecting me to ensure the police are getting out there and arresting lots of youngsters if lots of youngsters are offending, et cetera, et cetera. But nevertheless I believe a change is needed.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can I just perhaps relate a possible issue that might arise and ask maybe how this will work on an operational level? Supposing a child turns up at school this morning and there is a problem with a child with clothing, maybe bruises or something like that, how does that work so that the link between Education, the police, Social Services, can you just give us an example if you might have an involvement with that and how?
Ms. C. Davison:
If a child turns up to school in that sort of state all schools know that it is one standard form that they automatically do referrals through to Social Services. It is a standard form. It goes through the Child Protection Officer within the school and it automatically gets referred to Social Services. Anything like that automatically through Social Services will be then referred to the police, so it will either be a Sergeant or a Detective Inspector in the Public Protection Unit that will have a possible strategy discussion with the Children's Service if it is something that needs to be acted on immediately that day, or sometimes we think actually we need the school involved, we need to know a bit more about the family, we will then also include the school and have a strategy meeting and act immediately on whatever information it is we have received.
Senator A. Breckon:
In some cases families may be known to you so you would take a view.
Ms. C. Davison:
Absolutely. They may already be open to the long term team so will involve those anyway if they are already involved in that family. But it is acted on immediately.
Senator A. Breckon:
Has some of this come from the Children's Executive or was a system in place before some of the stuff that fell out of Kathy Bull?
Ms. C. Davison:
I have to say I do not know how that system was put in place.
Senator A. Breckon:
Could you comment as well, at the same time, about the work that is being done by June Thoburn and that group? Are you involved with that at an operational level?
Ms. C. Davison:
No, we are not. That is at management level.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Can I just say that the Public Protection Unit has had a massive increase in its workload in recent times. I think, if I am correct, I was told that it had 150 per cent increase in referrals in recent times. This is partly I think to do with the aftermath of the historical abuse inquiry but also partly to do with the Baby P case and agencies have become much more cautious in terms of how they are dealing with things, and far more things are being referred to our people, with a massive workload increase as a result.
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
Can you just clarify that? You said the schools have one standard form; what sort of numbers are we talking about? Is that over a year, say? Has that increased dramatically?
Ms. C. Davison:
I would have to look on our exact figures of how many we get through from schools. We do have those stats. Of what referrals we have obviously not all of them come from schools; they can come from G.P.s (General Practitioners), they can come from church ministers, they can come from concerned neighbours (Clarification 01.06.09 - in fact any agency or concerned member of the public). The breakdown from schools, I am not sure how easy I would be able to give you that but obviously those then have the standard form but all schools do, and very often the schools might just phone up and say: "We have got this that has come in today, what do you think?" We say: "Give us the referral, we need the full facts and we will look at it as joint agencies."
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
I am just interested how that linked with that agency to schools is working. What sort of ratio and how that is followed through and has it increased with all the publicity of the recent 18 months or so?
Ms. C. Davison:
The whole workload, as Mr. Le Marquand said, has increased, I think it is 160 per cent. A lot of that has been because of the historical abuse inquiry but also it has become much more in the public domain and people are reporting more. Child protection seems to have got much more media attention which is
more people reporting, more concerned neighbours, even schools probably taking more attention.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
My understanding, again the officer can probably confirm this, is that we have had to second in some officers from another force to assist us because there is something like a 3-year training period for new officers working this area; is that right?
Ms. C. Davison:
It is probably about, 1-2 years.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
So we have had to respond to this by bringing in additional resources from other forces to help us pro tem. We do not know whether this is going to continue to be a working pressure area or whether numbers will drop, but this is one of the areas of pressure the police are facing at the moment.
Mr. B. Taylor :
Indeed we have moved resources into the department because there is a lead in time with the accreditation and the training that is required for that, but clearly it is an important priority. We need to act on it with a degree of urgency. So the resources had to come from elsewhere, but clearly we need to put them there to make sure we do meet these requirements, and that will continue.
Senator A. Breckon:
Ian, could you tell us from the Council of Ministers' point of view, we understand, although we have not seen the evidence yet, that the actual ministerial 3 Minister thing from the Children's Executive was abandoned, if that is the right term, in January this year. Is that your understanding?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
We have not met as such. The Health and Social Services ...
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Then you would not know if it had been abandoned anyway.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I think it is de facto been abandoned, and the assumption has been that Health and Social Services would lead on this, which they have been doing. What I can tell you, of course, there is in existence a social policy group which includes the same Ministers but also has Housing and ...
Senator A. Breckon: Planning, I think.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: No.
Senator A. Breckon: Social Security.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Social Security, yes. There are issues that have come up in that forum as well, although that forum at the moment is focusing on freeing up the exchange of information because of issues caused by data protection and so on, so that information can be shared between different agencies where it is in the interests of people. But that will provide some sort of forum, although my gut feeling is that a lot of these things have happened when people get together and form working groups to work on specific things.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can I ask you, what I was looking for was the Jersey Child Protection Committee, one of the contents of the letter of engagement of June Thoburn who chairs that was to: "Advise the 3 Ministers, that is to say Health and Social Services, Home Affairs and Education, Sport and Culture, on how multi-departmental and multi-agency working with children and young adults can be improved into the future." Are you aware of any of that work and have you anything to say about it?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
That would be done at officer level.
Senator A. Breckon:
You are saying from the operational point of view you do not have an involvement with that group?
Ms. C. Davison:
No. The Jersey Child Protection Committee is attended by senior management within the States of Jersey Police. But there is also a monthly multi-agency meeting held at Inspector level for us, (Clarification 01.06.09 - This is a Senior Managers multi-agency meeting. Any issues raised at this meeting will be taken through the Chair to the Jersey Child Protection Committee).
Senator A. Breckon: So it filters down?
Ms. C. Davison:
Absolutely. That is held the first Thursday of every month, but then if you talk about our multi-agency working, we also have a meeting every Friday with the income team at Social Services and the long term team at Social Services talking about the weekly (Clarification 01.06.09 - and ongoing enquiries) jobs that we have, so there is various multi-agency meetings happening on a regular basis.
Senator A. Breckon:
Ian, you touched on there that perhaps, and the States have touched on this, the Children's Minister, we have looked to a Minister or Assistant Minister with responsibility at that sort of level going towards Health, but would you like to comment on how you feel that we can learn from perhaps what we have not done and extend from that?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I think that is the right way forward but there will still be obviously responsibilities, as I mentioned before, that will remain with Home Affairs in our area, which will remain with Education. But the central core of it I think should come under the Children's Service operation of the wider remit. They are best placed to head it up.
Senator A. Breckon:
Do you think it would be a problem to break down some demarcation lines or respect the role of the authority of the police and whatever else, but the operational issues to deliver this service across the 3 areas that we know of?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I think the impression I get is that things are working very well operationally. I think that is from a police perspective; I think we think it is working very well operationally. The problem seem to lie right
there at the top level in terms of the Ministers just not co-ordinating together.
Senator A. Breckon:
From that then, has it been given, say, a high enough status up to Chief Officer where it has been a driver rather than somebody is doing something, let them get on with it? I mean I am not sure where we are with that.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
You are asking me to comment on my predecessors. I mean I never felt that the sort of issues that I talked about today were given high enough priority and that is why I was constantly complaining as magistrate about them. I mean my problem on incoming Minister of course has been that I have so many other things to do. So many different projects to work with. This has always been a very high priority for me, the sort of things I have spoken about.
Senator A. Breckon:
Would you agree then that we have to do something, assist them in place and then let the professionals get on with it? Is that really where we are, but give it the political height that it deserves?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Yes. I mean the role of the Ministers is to adjust the laws and so on to enable others further down to make it work. But I think that is where there have been some failures.
Deputy J.A. Hilton:
I think historically Children's Services and Social Services have been just completely and utterly neglected, in my opinion.
Senator A. Breckon:
Would you say from an operational level that you have a good working relationship with the other professionals from an operational point of view?
Mr. B. Taylor :
Yes, we do. I believe at all levels.
Ms. C. Davison: Absolutely, yes.
Mr. B. Taylor :
The system does work very well on the child protection side of things. I think where children enter into or are on the fringe of entering into criminality we want to avoid that wherever possible. We want to look at some sort of diversionary measures to make sure that children do not enter into the criminal justice system. A model I am accustomed to is the Criminal Justice Board which comprises police, Probation, the courts, the C.P.S. (Crown Prosecution Service), the law officers, prison and the Youth Offending Teams, and collectively overlook across a broad arena of criminal justice matters, but they do have responsibilities for child and youth offending as well. Within that they would put in place models or policies to deal with prolific and priority offenders, that hardcore of individuals who are offending, have entered the criminal justice system and try to manage those, so manage them out of the criminal justice system to some extent where there are key programmes operated by the Youth Offending Team, but equally working in association with the Child Protection Board as well, where those children who are on the fringe of maybe entering the criminal justice system can be diverted away from it, and the dialogue between those 2 groups is absolutely essential. Restorative justice works rather well in those cases.
QUESTION: (But where is the diversionary tactic?)
Mr. B Taylor
I think you can mirror that to some extent with the honorary system here in the Parishes where somebody may be brought forward before the Parish and with some sort of restorative justice approach, they can very often be diverted from the criminal justice system.
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
Can I just draw you on that? Do you think the restorative justice approach is used enough in Jersey?
Mr. B. Taylor :
I do not know how often it is used in Jersey. I mean certainly that seems to be a system that works well in the Parishes for some of the low level issues and the minor type issues, and hopefully that will divert people away from any other offending at all. I do not think it gets used often enough elsewhere. There are only pockets of it elsewhere in the U.K. but where it does work, and indeed internationally, it is very, very effective.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Can I comment on that, because I think that is in my area of knowledge. In a sense, yes, the diversion process that we have in Jersey is the Parish Hall system and that has been universally praised by all who have looked at it in recent years, in fact they have talked about wanting to strengthen it. Part of what is used is sometimes restorative justice. That is normally done in conjunction with Probation because sometimes people are put on voluntary probation orders or whatever as part of the process. I am very keen to divert people away from the criminal justice system at the lower levels; very, very keen to see that. It works very, very well for an awful lot of people so the comments I have been making in relation to those for whom it does not work and who repeat may cloud the fact that I am very positive. The other aspect of course is that some of the other functions which Barry was talking about are functions which the Youth Action Team and its executive were meant to pick up, this business of identifying youngsters who are potentially at risk at an early stage and doing intervention work at an early stage with them. Now that undoubtedly has been happening and I think needs to be strengthened, and that is part of what Williamson is seeking to do.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can I come back, Ian, to something you mentioned earlier, and we have already had a professional view and we spoke to some of the youngsters in the Young Offenders Centre to get their view without any officers present just to find out what they could tell us what they wanted to tell us. A professional view and the view of them was that where you draw a line on age then it is difficult depending on the maturity of the person, and a view has been expressed that perhaps we should have some flexibility, if you like, up to the age of 21 about where a young person could be; whether it is something you mentioned about Greenfields or whether it is La Moye because what they said is, something you touched on, is remand is Greenfields, the sentence is La Moye and somebody at 15 said the influence of him at 15 with 21 year- olds was difficult and he probably learnt some skills that he did not have before in criminality and he did the revolving door.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
You are coming back to the difficult problem as to where you put the divide between the Young Offenders Institution and Greenfields, assuming you are sentencing people to Greenfields. I did a lot of work on this as magistrate with the Probation Service some years back and we recognised that probably all the 15 year-olds needed to go in one direction. We recognised in relation to the 16 year-olds that maybe a system ought to be either way because there would be some 16 year-olds who would be better
to be placed in the Y.O.I. (Youth Offenders Institution) because of the corrupting influence they would have on the younger children who might be at Greenfields, and there would be some 16 and maybe even 17 year-olds potentially who would be better at Greenfields. The difficulty is that when you start to run such a system you have to have a way of doing it and it has to be human rights compliance and all sorts of technical issues start to arise as to who makes the decision as to which institution people go. But you are right, in an ideal situation there would be a group in the middle where there would be flexibility. One of the particular problems noted by staff at Greenfields over a long period of time is the problem where you have got a youngster who has served a sentence at the Young Offenders Institution and who then comes back into the system a much more sophisticated criminal. They probably would be anyway by the fact that they would not get to serve such a sentence unless they were a repeat repeat repeat offender, and they are then mixing with others who are being remanded and also with these others who are there under the civil thing; and that does create a problem. It does create a problem but ...
Senator A. Breckon:
Just on that, could I perhaps put an extension which is beyond our remit but a view was expressed to us, when we talked to young offenders about reaching the age of 21 and crossing the yard, as it were, they went: "Not with some of them big boys. There is some nasty stuff in there. We would be under different pressures" and they felt perhaps they would be intimidated by that. There could be adverse effects. I mean, would you like to express an opinion on that?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Sorry, you are talking about the move from the Young Offenders Institution to the adult prison?
Senator A. Breckon:
Yes. There is a fear in this ...
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
You have always got a problem, have you not, as to where you set the age groups. I mean we have chosen to set it at 20 although, of course, the age of majority is now 18. Sorry, up to 20. Again, we come back to the problems and pressures of the small jurisdiction, whereas in the U.K. I believe they set their ages quite differently, and Barry knows exactly where they are, but I think they have almost got an 18 to 20s prison and a 15 to 18, so I do not know.
Mr. B. Taylor :
There are Youth Offending Institutes which can go to 18 to 21 but it does not always obtain. That person becomes an adult when they are 17, by in large, although under some Children's Law they become adults at the age of 18, it is a little bit confusing. But some people who offend at the age of 17 can go to prison, invariably they would go to a Young Offenders Institute and could do until they are 21 but often while they are there they will be moved to an adult prison. So there is some flexibility but the line is a little bit blurred.
Senator A. Breckon:
Can you just clarify this for me? I understand as well with the young offenders in the U.K. there are also secure units which are at a slightly lower level so there can be a transfer; is that the case?
Mr. B. Taylor :
Yes, that is the case. There are not enough but they do exist.
Senator A. Breckon:
I just wondered, Ian, I come back to you with that, do you think then if we are drawing lines maybe is there an argument to make for some flexibility to take into the case management and rehabilitation?
I think in round about the 16 year-olds, yes, there is a case to be made for it either way situation. I do not think it would be easy to operate at an older age group. I think there has to be a couple of points. You run into all sorts of difficulties. Once you get subjected positions being made on anything other than age as to whether people go here or go there ...
Senator A. Breckon:
Is that you saying you do not want discretion for yourself to make a decision?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: It creates enormous problems.
Senator A. Breckon: Yes, for challenges.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand: In practice.
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
Just one of the other points that came up with the young offenders yesterday, and they had obviously had experience with the U.K. because it was expressed to us quite strongly that if they had committed some of the offences that they had here back in the mainland they would not be in that institution. What are your thoughts on that?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
This could be so. It is part and parcel of the problem that they talked about the lack of secure children's home because in many cases in the U.K. they would probably be placed at a secure children's home rather than remanded in the criminal justice system. The fact is that we have not got the jurisdictions in a small jurisdiction to have a secure children's home running alongside ...
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
So we may be almost letting them down by the fact that we have got no other option. Is that a fair comment to make?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
I think we are always going to be under pressure. We cannot create all these parallel institutions. So, I accept that might be so but ... in reality a magistrate making - and I am very loathe to criticise magistrates. Not because we are some sort of closed shop but because I am well aware that they will have particular information on a particular occasion that those outside do not have. But in reality a magistrate faced with a classic situation of a youngster who is out of the control of their parents, who is running away from a children's home, who is therefore not ... representing a risk to themselves because the risk to the child is a relevant issue in terms of things like the International Convention of the Right of the Child, very often your decision comes back to this: do we return the child to the children's home knowing it is insecure, knowing they can walk out in 5 minutes time, knowing that they may take others with them to reoffend, or do we remand them in custody? Now, this is a very difficult choice. If we had a bail hostel or if we had a system of trained foster parents to whom people could go on remand, who had the ability to influence them, then obviously the courts would be delighted. I mean the last thing the courts want to do is to remand youngsters in custody.
Deputy T.M. Pitman:
I guess the point I am trying to get at is are we, purely because of circumstances, contributing to that cycle? I am almost making a self-fulfilling prophecy if you like. We have got nowhere else to go so that is where young people will end up, they are in the system purely because Jersey has nothing else to offer them.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
There is danger that because of the lack of the full range of facilities that are in the U.K. that youngsters are, as it were, put in contact with others who have more serious problems or could be accelerated up the system; yes, undoubtedly.
Senator A. Breckon: Is there anything else?
Deputy G.P. Southern :
Sorry, I missed your response to the original question from Trevor about did you agree that the likelihood was that in Jersey we do sentence more harshly than the U.K.?
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Not sentence. I was talking about remanding in custody. Shall I go over that again because you just missed that? The problem is that we have no secure children's homes so in reality a magistrate who is making a decision on remand, who have a choice between a custodial remand which means Greenfields, the alternative they may be looking at is remand on condition of living at a children's home. But its actual home is not secure and they know youngsters like to run away and therefore likely to reoffend, likely to put themselves at risk, it is more difficult. It is more difficult. You are more likely to feel that it is necessary to remand in custody because of the lack of other options. I mean this is the problem, not just for the magistrate but also for the Youth Panel because although the magistrate will make a decision on his own if the youth is presented other than at a Youth Panel then obviously normally when the Youth Court sits, it sits at 3 with 2 lay people in addition. But you are right, the lack of alternatives and, I have to say, I have to agree with my colleague, Deputy Hilton, the firm opinion of the Youth Court members in the period when I was dealing with matters was that the weakest link, if I can put it that way, was the children's homes. Consistently the police force operated well, the Education Service operated well, the Probation Service operated well, the Children's Service did not operate well. Now, that may have had to do with resourcing issues. It may have to do with ethos. It may have been 101 different things, and similarly, I say alongside that, that children's homes did not operate well. I am not talking about abuse, I am talking about just not functioning well as a system. My hope is that Williamson and more money being put into this will lead to the Children's Service functioning at an appropriate level which, in my opinion, it never has done. That was the opinion, I have to say, not just myself but for all the members of the Youth Panel. That was the difficulty. I believe the Youth Service was treated for long periods as a Cinderella service and was under-resourced and politically was not given the attention that it should have been given. I also believe that the decision that was made by the States to transfer the Children's Service from the Education Department to Health and Social Services, although it may have theoretically been right actually in practice was disastrous because while it remained within the Education Service, something of the Education Service's ethos of discipline and of making things work remained. Once it went to Children's Service the ethos very much became a welfare ethos of: "Well, we are here to look after the children" and discipline and these sort of issues rather went by the wayside. That is rather heavy criticism I am making. I am loathe to criticise generally as a person but it is a heavy criticism, but that is a view. Williamson gives an opportunity I think for the Children's Service to get it right which, in my opinion, they have not done for a very long period.
Senator A. Breckon:
I am conscious of the time. There might be some follow-up that we will require following that through the office, just questions that we might need some statistical information on or something like that, but anyway thank you for your time and effort. Just before we adjourn, could I ask if there is anything you would like to say to us that perhaps we have missed or you have just ... from anybody at all. You do not have to but it is just something we might have missed or a point you would like to make.
Mr. B. Taylor :
I have no particular points but thank you all for the opportunity to come here today and discuss the issues with you. They are very important areas.
Senator B.I. Le Marquand:
Yes, thank you, and thank you for the attention you are giving to this.
Senator A. Breckon:
Thank you for your time. It is short notice but, again, because we lost yesterday which was well arranged and well organised we have had to reshuffle and have to do so again anyway, so I will adjourn it anyway and thank you again for your time.