These amendments develop a theme that has already been debated by the Committee, both in terms of the principles behind the generic youth rehabilitation order and in relation to hierarchy of sentencing.

Amendment No. 103 would make the reparation requirement part of the generic youth rehabilitation order. In that connection, I want particularly to note the comments of the Magistrates Association during our evidence-taking sessions. The association expressed concern in evidence given on 16 October. In response to Question 61, Cindy Barnett, the chairman, explained her concerns that a separate reparation order with the generic youth rehabilitation order might lead to confusion. The association was concerned to ensure consistency and clarity about orders, both for the offender and for the court.

To be fair, we also heard that the Youth Justice Board did not share that concern. It wanted to ensure that there would be an appropriate hierarchy of sentences, going up the tariff. However, I suggest that  the Government cannot have it both ways in the matter of hierarchy. They argue that the intensive supervision and surveillance order should come as part of a generic order and that there is an inbuilt hierarchy within the generic youth rehabilitation orders; but at the same time they still want to keep an element of separateness with the reparation order.

There is concern about clarity. From speaking to practitioners and others, I know that when they come to court they want to know exactly what orders are in place. If we are to move towards adopting a generic order, it is important that it is all-encompassing, so that magistrates can deal with different levels of seriousness of offences appropriately, and, if an offence is at a low level and requires a first instalment of a youth rehabilitation order, a reparation order should be made within that order. I concede that there is an element of reparation already within the generic orders. However, I share the concerns of the Magistrates Association that there is still a need to deal with the matters together, by way of a generic order.

To return to the point that I made about the way in which the Bill has come before us following the discussions about the 2003Green Paper, the plans at that time for the action plan order entailed a menu to cover fines, reparation and a range of other specified activities. It would be interesting to know how we have moved on to keeping reparation orders separate from other, generic, orders. There used to be other low-level community sentences, such as attendance centre orders, which were kept separate, but—properly, in many ways—the generic order is now intended to include that element, by way of an activity requirement. The question is why a reparation order cannot similarly be part of the same order, for the sake of clarity, and for the sake of magistrates, offenders, practitioners and the public.