STRAW SEX AND DRUG POLICIES 'IGNORED'

Probation officers have attacked a series of measures introduced by Jack
Straw, the Home Secretary, saying they are unpopular, inappropriate and
largely ignored by the courts.

Schemes to tackle sex offenders, drug-related offenders and unruly
children, including the highly publicised child curfew and parenting order
schemes, are criticised in research by the National Association of
Probation Officers. It reveals, for example, that a large proportion of
drug addicts would rather go to jail than undergo treatment on a new
government programme.

Nearly six months after the introduction of the Crime and Disorder Act, the
courts have issued only 30 of the new drug treatment and testing orders.
About 60 of the 120 drug-related offenders who have been offered the
programme have refused to take part.

Harry Fletcher, of the association, said: "They say that having to report
every day for counselling and being tested several times a week was too
tough. They would rather go to prison and stay on the drugs."

The programme, which costs UKP6,000 per head, was introduced last September
in three pilot areas; Gloucestershire, Merseyside and Croydon. Offenders
are required to have intensive therapy five days a week and are subjected
to drug-testing between one and three times a week.

The association has written to the Home Office minister George Howarth to
complain about the "degrading" conditions in which testing takes place.
Lone female officers are having to watch over male offenders while they
produce a urine sample.

Probation officers also believe the Home Office's attempts to curb the
activities of sex offenders by making them subject to court orders are
proving unsuccessful. Only one Sex Offender Order has so far been imposed,
on the Manchester rapist Michael Gordon, 35. He was released last year
after being sentenced to 12 years in 1988 for raping two students. The
order places restrictions on his movements, breaches of which could result
in a five-year jail sentence.

Mr Fletcher said the idea that sex offenders spent "all day hanging around
playgrounds" was inaccurate. "Orders restricting their movements are very
limited. What is needed is intensive supervision and surveillance and a
requirement to undertake a sex offender treatment programme."

Other orders introduced in the Crime and Disorder Act have also been
largely ignored by the courts. Local child curfew schemes, designed to curb
the activities of persistent child offenders, have yet to be used anywhere
in the country, despite being available to the courts for nearly six months.

At the same time, the Government introduced parenting orders, designed to
help parents to prevent their children committing anti-social acts.
Although the orders have been available in nine pilot areas since
September, only 21 have been issued.

Mr Fletcher said the level of take-up of all the orders must be "extremely
disappointing" for the Home Office. And he added: "The idea of the blanket
child curfew was deeply flawed and the parenting orders were highly suspect."

A Home Office spokeswoman said the take-up of all the orders would be
reviewed.