The Crime and Disorder Bill is a central plank of Labour's legislative programme. The consent amendment notwithstanding, the new legislation marks a significant attack on democratic rights, and the rights of children in particular. The very concept of juvenile justice, as it has traditionally been understood, is ended in all but name. For a child aged between 10 and 13 years to be found guilty of a crime, the prosecution had to prove that the child knew its actions were seriously wrong and understood their consequences. This is now overturned.
Children are to be tried as adults.
One of the major attacks on legal rights made by the previous Conservative government was to curtail a suspect's right to silence. Labour's bill extends this to juvenile cases. Youth Justice Boards, Youth Offending Teams and a series of other bodies are to be established by every Local Authority to prevent crime involving juveniles. Certainly Blair has borrowed from Clinton a flair for combining supposedly democratic changes with the most retrogressive policies. The Crime and Disorder Bill also contained measures to make racially-motivated crime a specific offence, for instance.