Children and Young Persons Act 1963

Part I — Care and Control of Children and Young Persons

Welfare powers of local authorities

Extension of power to promote welfare of children

1

Children and young persons in need of care, protection or control

Children and young persons in need of care, protection or control

2

Children and young persons beyond control

3

Power to send case under s. 62 of principal Act to local juvenile court

4

Supervision orders and powers of court to deal with persons under supervision or in care of local authority

Supervision orders

5

• (1) Any supervision order (that is to say, any order made under any provision of the principal Act placing a child or young person under the supervision of a probation officer or of some other person appointed for the purpose by the court) which is made or amended after the commencement of this Act shall name the petty sessions area in which the person placed under supervision resides or will reside; and any powers exercisable by a juvenile court—

• (a) in relation to a supervision order so made or amended, shall be exercisable by a juvenile court acting for the petty sessions area for the time being named in the order; and

• (b) in relation to a supervision order made before and not amended after the commencement of this Act, shall be exercisable by a juvenile court acting for the petty sessions area in which the person placed under supervision resides.

• (2) Any supervision order (whether made before or alter the commencement of this Act) which places a person under the supervision of a probation officer shall have effect as an order placing him under the supervision of a probation officer appointed for or assigned to the petty sessions area for the time being named in the order (or, if none is named in the order, the petty sessions area in which that person resides) and selected in accordance with Schedule 1 to this Act.

• (3) A local authority may be appointed as the person under whose supervision a person is placed by a supervision order but, except where that person resides or will reside in their area, shall not be so appointed without their consent.

• (4) The provisions of Schedule 1 to this Act (which reproduce the effect of certain enactments relating to supervision orders with amendments consequential on the preceding provisions of this section and certain other amendments) shall have effect with regard to supervision orders, whether made before or after the commencement of this Act.

• (5) In this section and Schedule 1 to this Act, " petty sessions area " includes a division of the metropolitan area referred to in Part II of Schedule 2 to this Act.

Extension of s. 66 of principal Act

6

• (1) The powers of the juvenile court before which a person is brought under section 66(1) of the principal Act by a probation officer or other person under whose supervision he was placed by an order under that Act shall include power—

• (a) to order his parent or guardian to enter into a recognizance to exercise proper care and guardianship; and

• (b) in a case where the court orders him to be sent to an approved school or commits him to the care of a fit person, to revoke the order placing him under the supervision of the person by whom he is brought before the court;

and where the court exercises its power under paragraph (b) of this subsection to revoke the order mentioned therein, section 76 of the principal Act (which authorises committal to the care of a local authority) shall apply as it applies where no such order is in force.

The Magistrates' Courts Act 1952 shall apply in relation to a recognizance under this subsection as it applies in relation to a recognizance to be of good behaviour.

• (2) The age up to which a person may be brought before the court and dealt with under the said section 66 shall be eighteen instead of seventeen years.

Extension of powers of juvenile court to deal with persons in the care of local authorities

7

• (1) For section 65 of the principal Act there shall be substituted the following section:—

(65) (1) Where a local authority satisfy a juvenile court that a child or young person in their care under section 1 of the Children Act 1948 is refractory and the court thinks it expedient to do so, the court may— (a) order him to be sent to an approved school; or (b) commit him to the care of a fit person (other than that local authority) whether a relative or not, who is willing to undertake the care of him ; and where the court commits him to the care of a fit person and that person consents, it may also, if it thinks it expedient to do so, make an order placing the child or young person for a specified period, not exceeding three years, under the supervision of a probation officer or of some other person appointed for the purpose by the court. (2) Where a child or young person is in the care of a local authority by virtue of an order under the Matrimonial Proceedings (Children) Act 1958 or the Matrimonial Proceedings (Magistrates' Courts) Act 1960 the local authority may, with the leave of the court having power to vary or revoke the order, apply to a juvenile court under this section; and if on such an application they satisfy the juvenile court that the child or young person is refractory and the court thinks it expedient to do so, the court may order him to be sent to an approved school.

• (2) For subsection (8) of section 84 of the principal Act there shall be substituted the following subsection:—

(8) Where a local authority are of opinion that it is desirable to do so in the interests of a child or young person who has been committed to their care, they may apply to a juvenile count, and that court may, if it thinks it desirable in his interests to do so, revoke the order committing him to their care and, where it revokes that order— (a) commit him to the care of another fit person, whether a relative or not, who is willing to undertake the care of him ; or (b) order him to be sent to an approved school; or (c) order his parent or guardian to enter into a recognizance to exercise proper care and guardianship; or (d) without making any other order, or in addition to an order under paragraph (a) or paragraph (c) of this subsection, make an order placing him for a specified period, not exceeding three years, under the supervision of a probation officer, or of some other person appointed for the purpose by the court. The Magistrates' Courts Act 1952 shall apply in relation to a recognizance under this subsection as it applies in relation to a recognizance to be of good behaviour.

Approved schools

Selection of approved school

8

• (1) The school to which a person is to be sent in pursuance of an approved school order shall not be specified in the order; but the order shall be authority for his detention in any approved school and the school in which he is to be detained at any time shall be determined by the Secretary of State.

• (2) In determining the approved school in which a person is to be detained the Secretary of State shall, where practicable, select a school for persons of the religious persuasion to which he belongs.

• (3) If the parent, guardian or nearest adult relative of a person in respect of whom an approved school order has been made applies to a juvenile court for an order under this subsection and proves to the court that the religious persuasion of that person is not as declared (under section 70(1) of the principal Act) by the approved school order, the court shall by order declare the religious persuasion of that person to be that so proved and send a copy of its order to the Secretary of State ; but no such application with respect to a person under the care of the managers of an approved school shall be made later than thirty days after his arrival there.

• (4) An application under subsection (3) of this section may be made—

• (a) if the approved school order was made by a juvenile or other magistrates' court, to a juvenile court acting for the same petty sessions area as that court;

• (b) in any other case, to a juvenile court acting for the petty sessions area in which the applicant resides.

Temporary committal of persons ordered to be sent to approved schools

9

• (1) Every approved school order shall take effect immediately, but shall provide for such time (if any) as may elapse before the person to whom it relates can be sent to an approved school by committing him either—

• (a) to custody in a place specified in accordance with subsection (3) of this section ; or

• (b) to the custody of a fit person to whose care he might have been committed under the principal Act.

• (2) Any provision made in pursuance of subsection (1) of this section shall, unless extended under this subsection, cease to have effect at the expiration of twenty-eight days; and any such provision may, on the application of any person, be varied, and from time to time extended for not more than twenty-eight days, by a juvenile court, and may be so extended in the absence of the person to whom it relates.

• (3) The places to which a person may be committed in custody in pursuance of subsection (1)(a) of this section are—

• (a) if the approved school order is made on a conviction or finding of guilt, any place to which he might have been committed on remand; and

• (b) in any other case, any place of safety.

• (4) If a juvenile court which proposes to make or vary such a provision as is mentioned in subsection (1) of this section in respect of a person who has attained the age of fourteen is satisfied that he is of so unruly a character that he cannot safely be detained in a remand home or other place of safety or of so depraved a character that he is not fit to be so detained, and the court has been notified by the Secretary of State that a remand centre is available for the reception from that court of persons of his class or description, the remand centre may for the purposes of that provision be treated as a place of safety.

• (5) Subsections (2) to (4) of section 6 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1938 (which make provision for children and young persons needing medical treatment while in a place of safety) shall with the necessary modifications apply in relation to an approved school order providing for the temporary detention of a person in a remand home or other place of safety as they apply in relation to such orders as are mentioned in subsection (2) of that section.

Escape of persons subject to approved school orders

10

• (1) If a person has, in pursuance of section 9 of this Act, been committed by an approved school order to custody in any place other than a prison, remand home, remand centre or special reception centre or to the custody of a fit person, and he escapes or is without lawful authority taken from that custody, he may be arrested without warrant in any part of the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man.

• (2) Subject to subsection (3) of this section, a person arrested under subsection (1) of this section shall be brought back to the place from which, or as the case may be to the person from whom, he escaped or was taken.

• (3) If the occupier of that place or that person is not willing to receive him, he shall be brought before a juvenile court with a view to the variation of the approved school order under subsection (2) of the said section 9.

• (4) Any person who is arrested under section 82(1) of the principal Act (which relates to the escape of persons sent to approved schools) after having escaped from any hospital, home or institution or after having run away from the person in whose charge he was may, instead of being brought back to his school, be brought back to the hospital, home or institution from which he escaped or, as the case may be, to the person in whose charge he was; and the expenses of bringing a person back in accordance with this subsection shall be borne by the managers of his school.

• (5) Subsection (2) of the said section 82 (which provides for increasing the period of detention of a person brought back to his school) shall extend to any person brought back (whether to his school or elsewhere) after escaping or being taken away from the place in which or the person in whose custody he was after the making of an approved school order in respect of him.

• (6) Any person who—

• (a) knowingly assists or induces a person to escape from any such custody as is referred to in subsection (1) of this section, or

• (b) without lawful authority takes a person away from such custody, or

• (c) knowingly harbours or conceals a person who has so escaped or has been so taken away or prevents him from returning,

shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to both.

Designation of remand homes as classifying centres for persons ordered to be sent to approved schools

11

• (1) The Secretary of State may with the consent of a local authority providing a remand home designate the remand home as a classifying centre for persons who have been ordered to be sent to an approved school and may at any time cancel such a designation.

• (2) To the extent that a remand home for the time being designated under this section is used as a classifying centre the provisions of the enactments specified in subsection (4) of this section shall apply in relation to it and to persons detained in it as they apply in relation to an approved school and to persons detained in an approved school; and accordingly section 78(4) of the principal Act (which relates to persons escaping from remand homes) shall not apply in relation to persons detained in a classifying centre in pursuance of this section.

• (3) The Secretary of State may, after consulting the local authority providing a remand home which has been or is to be designated under this section, direct that so much of their expenses in providing and maintaining the home as is attributable to its use as a classifying centre shall be treated for the purposes of sections 90 and 104 of the principal Act as if they were expenses incurred by the authority as managers of an approved school.

• (4) The enactments referred to in subsection (2) of this section are—

• (a) in the principal Act, sections 58, 72, 81 to 83 and 106 and Schedule 4 except paragraphs 1 to 3, 7 and 14 ;

• (b) section 72 of the Criminal Justice Act 1948 ;

• (c) section 79 of the Mental Health Act 1959 ;

• (d) sections 15 to 17 of the Criminal Justice Act 1961;

• (e) any enactment contained in this Act.

Contributions in respect of persons transferred from schools in Scotland or Northern Ireland

12

Where a person has been transferred to an approved school under section 83 of the principal Act (which enables persons detained in schools in Scotland or Northern Ireland to be transferred to approved schools in England or Wales) sections 86 to 89 of that Act (which relate to contributions) shall apply in relation to him as if the order under which he was detained before his transfer were an approved school order.

Contributions by persons detained in approved schools

13

Notwithstanding anything in section 24 of the Children Act 1948, no person under the care of the managers of an approved school shall be liable under section 86 of the principal Act to make contributions in respect of himself to a local authority; but any such person who is engaged in remunerative work shall pay to the managers such weekly sum towards then-expenses as the Secretary of State may determine, but not in respect of any period during which he is out from the school under supervision.

Duty of parents to notify changes of address to approved school or fit person

14

• (1) The parent of a person who is detained in an approved school or is in the care of a fit person in pursuance of an order under the principal Act shall keep the managers of the approved school or, as the case may be, the fit person informed of the parent's address.

• (2) Where a person is transferred from one approved school to another the managers of the school from which he is transferred shall, where possible, inform his parents of the transfer; and until his parent has been so informed, the parent's duty under subsection (1) of this section shall be deemed to be duly discharged if he keeps the managers of the first-mentioned school informed of his address.

• (3) Where, in pursuance of subsection (1) of this section, the managers of an approved school or a local authority are informed of a change in a parent's address they shall give notice of the new address to the local authority in whose area the parent was residing before the change.

• (4) A parent of a person who, knowing that that person is detained in an approved school or in the care of a fit person as mentioned in subsection (1) of this section, fails to comply with that subsection shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five pounds; but in any proceedings under this subsection it shall be a defence to prove that the defendant was residing at the same address as the other parent and had reasonable cause to believe that the other parent had kept the managers or fit person informed of the address of both.

• (5) Section 87(5) of the principal Act (which requires a person on whom a contribution order has been made to notify changes in his address) shall cease to have effect.

Effect of approved school order on fit person or local authority

15

• (1) Where a person has been committed by order of a court to the care of a fit person and, while the order is in force, an approved school order is made in respect of him, the order committing him to the care of that person shall be of no effect while he is under the care of the managers of an approved school; but this section shall not affect the power of the Secretary of State under subsection (4) of section 84 of the principal Act to discharge him from the care of the person to whose care he has been committed by the first-mentioned order or the power of the court under subsection (6) of that section to vary or revoke that order.