CHANGES to youth justice laws proposed in the Tories’ policing Bill risk breaching international law on the rights of children, experts have warned MPs. 

The Policing, Crime, Courts & Sentencing Bill would force courts to impose minimum sentences for certain crimes except in exceptional circumstances and increase custodial sentences. 

Under the proposals, children convicted of serious violent or sexual offences would also be required to serve three quarters of their sentence rather than half as is the case now. 

Giving evidence to Parliament’s human rights select committee today, Howard League for Penal Reform legal director Dr Laura Janes warned that imposing mandatory minimum sentences “absolutely infringes on rights.” 

She said the proposals are contrary to the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child, which states that children should only be detained as a matter of last resort and for the shortest possible time. 

“And here we have the provision that says it should be the norm,” she said. There is also no evidence that it’s going to reduce crime, she added. 

Speaking earlier, Alliance for Youth Justice director Pippa Goodfellow said the changes would result in more children being placed behind bars, risking a turnaround in the reduction of youth offenders in detention seen over recent years. 

Dr Janes said that measures that increase the number of children in custody will disproportionately affect black and ethnic minority children, who are over-represented in youth detention. 

The government’s own equality impact assessment recognises that changes in the Bill could lead to indirect discrimination.

Lawyer Danielle Manson said it was difficult to reconcile that the government would allow proposed changes it recognises as potentially leading to an increase in discrimination.

The policing Bill returns to the Commons next week.