CRIMINAL PROCEDURE CODE (AMENDMENT) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

10.26 a.m.

The Chief Secretary (Mr W. A. C. Goode): Sir, I move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

Sir, this is the first of three Bills standing in my name in the Order Paper all of which are measures to enact the legislation required to establish in Singapore the system of reformative training for young offenders between the ages of 16 and 21, which is commonly known as the Borstal System. We already have provision for children and young persons, that is to say, the age group 7 to 16. They are provided for under the Children and Young Persons Ordinance by means of remand homes, approved schools, approved homes and other special places of detention; and provision has also been made for the reformative treatment of those who are over 21 years of age. The High Court can sentence them to corrective training with a view to their reformation and the prevention of crime, but as yet we have no properly established system for dealing with the age group 16 to 21. As a temporary expedient, we have segregated them from the older and hardened criminals in the prison by setting aside a Young Offenders Section to which those young people over 15 are now sent. But this has only achieved segregation and has not provided adequately for any reformative training, nor have the courts at present power to sentence people to reformative training. It is high time that we did make proper provision for the enlightened treatment of this age group 16 to 21. This is an age at which the majority are likely to respond to expert efforts to reclaim them from crime and to prevent them from becoming criminals.

The development programme provides for building a new Borstal Institution and in our Development Estimates for next year we have entered a vote of $1,000 for preliminary work with a view to building a new Borstal Institution to house 300 persons. But we can make a start immediately without waiting for the new building. The old remand prison at Outram Road Prison has been separated from the rest of the prison and it has been converted so that it can be used for a reformative training centre. It will accommodate 120 boys. Staff can be found from the existing prison staff, and again in the 1957 Estimates recently approved by this Assembly, provision was made for the necessary funds to pay the staff and to run a reformative centre in the Outram Road Prison. I am sure that this legislation will have the support of all of us in this House.

Sir, this Bill gives the High Court and District Courts power to pass a sentence of reformative training for young males between the ages of 16 and 21, and it also enables Magistrates' Courts and Juvenile Courts to send up to the District Courts appropriate cases for sentences of reformative training. In each case the Court is required to satisfy itself that the boy is suitable for reformative training, and clause 3 (5) and (6) on pages 2 and 3 of the Bill ensure that great care is taken in assessing the suitability of each case.

An important principle in this Bill is that it provides for flexibility which is necessary in these cases. Prisoners do not remain tidily in one age group during the period of their sentences, nor will they all respond in the same way to the reformative treatment. One may be ready for release much earlier than another, and what is decisive in this Borstal System is not so much the gravity of the offence for which the lad was convicted, but the reformation of the boy. So it is that the Courts are not empowered to impose a period in sentencing a person to reformative training under this Bill. The law provides in clause 2 merely for a sentence of reformative training. The actual period in each case is decided later by the Visiting Justices as is set out in detail in Schedule D, subject only to a minimum period of 18 months, that minimum period being provided so that there is time for the training at the centre to have effect on the boy, and subject to a maximum period of three years, though it can be five years for certain graver offences. In this way, the length of training in a reformative centre can be adjusted to the nature of the person concerned, the whole object being to reform this young boy and turn him into a useful citizen.

Sir, I beg to move.

Question proposed.

10.34 a.m.

Mr R. C. H. Lim (Nominated): Mr Speaker, Sir, the purpose of reformative training will be entirely lost unless these young offenders are housed in a building which has not the appearance of a prison. While welcoming this Bill, I think we should be very careful to keep these young offenders as far away from a prison in Singapore as possible. Not only the building where these young offenders are to be housed should be away from any prison, but it should be so constructed and arranged that it has not the slightest appearance of a prison.

Mr Goode rose -

Mr Speaker: Mr Chief Secretary, in reply?

Mr Goode: Yes, Sir, I agree entirely that the view expressed by the hon. Member is important, that a Borstal Institution should not be regarded as a prison, and our plans for the new institution are that it shall be well away from any existing prison. We have done what we can in converting the old remand prison to separate it as far as possible from the other parts of the prison. There will be a separate entrance and it will be an entrance which is connected with the offices of the prison administration rather than with the remainder of the prison, but, nevertheless, it is, of course, a disadvantage that the institution will start in what is commonly regarded as a prison. But as against that, we feel that we should make a start. We have something like 80 young lads now undergoing prison sentences and we can do something for them even if the conditions are not ideal, and we should like to start on trying to rescue these young men rather than wait until we can get what might be a much more ideal institution site.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.