Imposition of unpaid work requirement for breach of community order

I beg to move amendment No. 89, in clause 22, page 16, line 35, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘50’.

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment No. 90, in clause 22, page 16, line 35, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘45’.

Amendment No. 91, in clause 22, page 16, line 35, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘35’.

Amendment No. 92, in clause 22, page 16, line 35, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘30’.

Amendment No. 93, in clause 22, page 16, line 35, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘25’.

Amendment No. 94, in clause 22, page 16, line 43, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘50’.

Amendment No. 95, in clause 22, page 16, line 43, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘45’.

Amendment No. 96, in clause 22, page 16, line 43, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘35’.

Amendment No. 97, in clause 22, page 16, line 43, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘30’.

Amendment No. 98, in clause 22, page 16, line 43, leave out ‘20’ and insert ‘25’.

Clause stand part.

I do not propose to take too much of the Committee’s time on these amendments, whose purpose is to probe the Government on the figures that they have chosen, which are essentially to provide an alternative to a requirement of 40 hours of unpaid work and substitute 20 where there has been a breach of a community order.

As a minimum.

That is quite right. The point of the amendments is to consider a sliding scale and whether that minimum could be set on the sliding scale between 20 and 50. Without getting too wrapped up in the individual numbers, could there be more flexibility explicit in the Bill to ensure that magistrates do not feel that they have to work to a prescribed level when dealing with a breach of a community order? That is the point of the amendments.

Let me turn now to the stand part debate. The concern is about dealing with defendants who have breached the community order and the need to impose an unpaid work requirement. Such people, who would no doubt often have a rehabilitation order imposed on them rather than a community punishment order, may not be suitable for unpaid work when that order is made. They might have health issues, or they may be an addict whose probation officer has determined that they are unsuitable for unpaid work. They would come before the magistrates after breaching the community order and, on the face of it, would not be eligible for the imposition of unpaid work. The concern is about whether the clause would impose an inappropriate sentence on those defendants.

I would also like the Minister to consider the question of flexibility. Magistrates might often want, not always as a matter of compulsion, to impose an additional penalty when there is a breach. Will the Minister also consider the unusual circumstances in which an order might break down through no fault of the defendant beyond a technical non-compliance? There might be a need to consider discretion.

As the hon. Gentleman knows, I have not often departed from much of what he has had to say. It seems, however, that his amendments would do the opposite of what he hopes that they would achieve. Do they not reduce the discretion available to the court by inserting a higher figure for the minimum work requirement  that the magistrates court can impose? Perhaps I have misread the provisions of the original clause, but that was certainly the impression that I was given.

I am grateful for the intervention, which enables me to clarify. The purpose of the amendment, which could perhaps be better drafted, is to ensure flexibility in the numbers for the hours of unpaid work that are available. I wanted to draw out a comment from the Minister about why the Government have settled on 20 as a minimum, rather than another number, and to make the more general point about the suitability of such an order in some circumstances.

The clause attempts to set the minimum number of hours that may be imposed as a penalty when an offender breaches a community order. At the moment, the minimum figure is 40 hours. The Bill would set a minimum of 20 hours, while the amendments range from 20 to 50, which is above the above the current minimum.

The minimum of 40 hours that can be imposed as a penalty is, in some cases, too severe a response. I have attempted to take the approach that a minimum of 20 hours will be examined by the courts in the event of a breach. There is a precedent for 20 hours. Section 300 and schedule 31 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 allow unpaid work of at least 20 hours to be imposed for fine default as an alternative to committal to prison. We have tried to establish that baseline, linked to the 2003 Act.

The amendments would replace the proposed 20 hours with a larger figure. In some cases, they would increase the current minimum of 40 hours and, in others, they would decrease it. I believe that 20 hours is a fair minimum. It could obviously be increased at the discretion of the sentencers. The new minimum will be a far better figure in terms of the fairness of the penalty than the current minimum of 40 hours.

We are attempting to examine this in detail and the current minimum applies only to those community orders that do not already have an unpaid work requirement. Where there is such a requirement, there is no minimum to the amount of unpaid work that may be added for the breach. The danger is that, where a court feels that adding 40 hours is too much, it may instead resentence the offender, possibly even to a short period of custody. My intention is reduce the minimum to 20 hours. I ask the hon. Gentleman to reflect on whether he wants to have a different minimum and whether in reality he wants to increase the minimum from 40 hours to 50 hours. Having got to know him over the last few weeks, I suspect that he would not wish to do that. I urge him to accept our minimum of 20 hours and withdraw his amendment accordingly.

Having heard the rationale for 20 hours, I will not press the amendment. However, I ask the Minister to respond at some point to our concerns about the imposition of unpaid work requirements on those defendants who have already been found not to be suitable for such unpaid work, which led to the original imposition of a rehabilitation order. There is a concern that this order should not set up claimants to fail. That important flexibility is needed within the system. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 22 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 23 ordered to stand part of the Bill.