Hansard

I very much welcome the opportunity to tell members about the work that we are doing to improve the effectiveness of secure accommodation in Scotland. I will also draw the Parliament's attention to some of the challenges facing the sector. I will paint a rounded picture for members, highlighting both the strengths and the weaknesses in the secure estate. By making this statement, which has been agreed with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, I hope to get consensus across the chamber that we need to work together to ensure that Scotland's secure provision is fit for purpose. We need a secure estate that both helps to improve outcomes for the small number of high-risk young people who require it and protects the public.

I hardly need to remind members of Scotland's long and proud tradition of taking a child-centred approach when it comes to services for young people. The focus of the Scottish children's hearings system on needs as well as deeds is unique. Scotland's secure estate is located firmly within that welfare framework. It provides high-quality care and education for young people up to the age of 18 who have been deemed by children's hearings to pose a serious risk to themselves and/or others or who are required to be detained by the court. Young people are placed in secure care by local authorities or, in the case of those who are sentenced by the court, on the authority of Scottish ministers.

Scotland has seven secure units, offering 124 places. Five of them are owned and operated by independent charities: St Mary's Kenmure in Bishopbriggs, East Dunbartonshire; St Philip's in Airdrie, North Lanarkshire; Kibble in Paisley, Renfrewshire; Rossie in Montrose, Angus; and the Good Shepherd centre in Bishopton, Renfrewshire. Two units are owned and operated by local authorities: the Elms in Dundee; and Edinburgh secure services in Edinburgh.

Staff in secure units work daily with some of Scotland's most challenging, and yet most powerless, young people. During my visit to Kibble secure unit in Paisley earlier this week, I was impressed again by the fierce commitment of staff to the young people in their care. I am sure that members will agree that the work that secure care staff carry out to help stabilise lives, protect youngsters and make our communities safer is invaluable—although, I regret to say, it is too infrequently recognised or celebrated. I therefore take this opportunity to thank all those who work in secure accommodation for what they do for our young people.

In March we saw only too clearly how challenging that work can be. St Mary's Kenmure in Bishopbriggs, near Glasgow, was forced to close temporarily following a serious disturbance, during which a number of young people absconded from the unit. Although that was a unique incident in Scotland's secure care history, it gave the whole secure estate occasion to reflect on the difficulties associated with caring for young people. A number of important lessons have been learned, particularly in relation to staffing and security.

I visited St Mary's Kenmure on 29 July, shortly before it reopened. David Whitton MSP, in whose constituency St Mary's is located, joined me on the visit. I spoke to staff and was reassured by the measures that the board of managers has taken to address the factors that contributed to the incident and to minimise the risk of such an incident happening again.

Immediately following the events in March, the board of managers of St Mary's appointed an independent expert to lead a thorough investigation. Managers and staff at St Mary's have worked incredibly hard over the past four months, and I am delighted to report that they have successfully implemented the recommendations set out in the internal report as well as those made in the inspection report from the Scottish Commission for the Regulation of Care. Improvements include stronger and more effective leadership; a revised management and staffing structure; better staff induction; replacement and reinforcement of external windows; training for staff in the new security procedures; and repair and redecoration of damaged areas.

St Mary's Kenmure has now reopened, and I am pleased by how responsibly the unit, which has a long history of positive inspection reports, has acted in facing up to the issues that led to the crisis. I am also confident that others in the sector, through the well-established secure forum, will become wiser as a result of that traumatic experience.

Moving on to the strategic issues facing the estate, I acknowledge the very significant programme of investment in the secure estate that was made by the previous Administration, which we are committed to completing. The investment of more than £20 million increased the total number and geographical spread of secure places, and improved specialist provision, with the creation of a dedicated unit for girls and young women and better support for those with mental health problems. The final stage of the redevelopment will be completed shortly, with Rossie due to open its refurbished unit near Montrose early in 2009.

However, the improvements to the estate have come at a cost. The increase in demand that was projected when the programme was planned has not come to pass. At a time when our prisons are bursting at the seams, secure units have experienced difficulties in maintaining capacity. Let us be clear: a reduced number of young people in secure care would be something to celebrate. There are strong signs that more young people are being kept safely in their communities as a result of the increased availability of alternatives to secure accommodation. One such alternative is intensive support and monitoring, which this Government has rolled out to all areas of Scotland.

Intensive support and monitoring services—ISMS—provide local partners with a robust alternative to secure accommodation and show how the combination of support and control can keep young people and communities safe in a more cost-effective way. Early evidence shows that that community-based alternative is having a real impact, with reduced reoffending and improved outcomes. No wonder practitioners prefer ISMS to under-16 antisocial behaviour orders, which are designed in a way that risks doing little more than setting children up to fail.

However, the providers of secure accommodation cannot sustain a position in which costs exceed income and which is already threatening outcomes for young people. Does Scotland want to lose in an unplanned manner what is arguably world-class provision? Do we want a situation in which increasing costs mean that purchasers are forced to make decisions on a financial rather than a child-centred basis? I am sure that members in the chamber this afternoon will share my concern about those issues. Our priority must be to work in partnership to ensure that Scotland has the right range of services to keep young people and the public safe, while maintaining youngsters in their communities wherever possible.

We have therefore made a commitment with COSLA to work with secure providers to find a sustainable way forward that makes the best use of the estate and meets the needs of vulnerable young people and their communities. That work will include looking at the opportunities afforded by capacity in the secure estate to address the needs of other vulnerable young people.

This Government is committed to the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and we are working to keep children out of prison. That is why we will legislate next year to abolish the unruly certificate, which enables children to be remanded to adult prisons. A short-life working group, the securing our future initiative—SOFI—has been tasked with considering how best to meet the nation's need for secure accommodation over the short to medium term. The group will produce recommendations for the Government and COSLA by spring next year. That work is being undertaken as part of the national residential child care initiative that was announced by the Minister for Children and Early Years, Adam Ingram, in February. The initiative is aimed at shaping the future direction of services to suit the needs of children and young people, in order to ensure that residential placements are the best choice for those children who need to live away from home. Both pieces of work are being independently led on the Government's behalf by the Scottish institute for residential child care.

Members will surely agree that the young person's best interests must be at the very heart of future policy direction. Our secure estate must reflect the needs of troubled young people rather than society's inability to provide alternative care. To repeat Adam Ingram's recent message, we want every care home, including secure care homes, to be the first and best choice for those children and young people, rather than a place of last resort. That is why it is vital that we work in partnership—including with local authorities, providers of secure care, young people who stay in secure care, their families and communities—to ensure that our secure accommodation estate is fit for purpose for today and for where Scotland wants to be in future.