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Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

I would like to add a word in support of what the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, has just said. Two years in the life of a child under the age of 18 is a very long time. It may not seem very much to us in our hoary and advanced stages of life but, at the age of 16 or 17, two years is not far short of infinity. It is terribly important in the circumstances with which magistrates’ courts will deal to offer the prospect to the young offender—the child—of being able to achieve something by improving his or her behaviour. The amendment proposes to reduce the minimum length of an ASBO from two years to three months, which would give a degree of flexibility that meets in rather a helpful way the thought that I have just endeavoured to express. I therefore hope that the Minister will deal with it sympathetically when he replies.