Vulnerable children in England and Wales are being locked in police cells as a substitute for social and health care, a report has said.
Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary said units were often full of children and vulnerable adults, rather than people accused of crimes.
The report said children were often detained when parents and care homes could not cope with them.
Home Secretary Theresa May said more needed to be done to tackle the issue.
Inspectors said too many children and vulnerable adults were being detained by police who felt under pressure to make arrests.
They spoke to police officers who said they were "called frequently to deal with incidents where parents or children's homes could not cope with a child's disruptive behaviour and sought to use the police as a way to discipline children".
Among those held in police cells was a girl who had fought with her sister over a TV remote control and a 17-year-old boy who had pushed his step-father and damaged a garden fence, the report found.
The report said frontline police officers and custody officers were also spending significant amounts of time caring for people who were mentally unwell and, on too many occasions, police were the default response for vulnerable people in crisis.
'Poor treatment'The report, which was commissioned by the home secretary, also expressed concern that people from African-Caribbean backgrounds were more likely to be strip-searched in police custody than any other ethnic group.
The majority of people detained by the police were reasonably well cared for but inconsistency of practices led on occasion to poor treatment, the report found.
HM Inspector of Constabulary Dru Sharpling said: "There can be no argument that the needs of a child, left abandoned by his or her parents, or a person in the midst of a mental health crisis, are often very different to those of a serial offender.
"Yet the bricks and mortar of the police cells do not and cannot make that distinction.
"I think the public would be surprised to learn that police cells are very often full of vulnerable adults and children, rather than suspects accused of serious crimes.
"I am particularly concerned to find that on occasions when officers were left with no other option, they resorted to detaining vulnerable people in police custody in order to get them the support they needed."
'More respect'HMIC was asked to look specifically at the treatment of children, people who were mentally unwell and people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds.
Mrs May said the report showed how much more needed to be done to ensure those who end up in police cells receive proper treatment and respect.
"Working with police forces, we already have a range of work under way to tackle some of the issues HMIC have highlighted, including improving data collection on the use of police powers in relation to people with mental ill health and the use of force, as well as reviewing police training on these issues," she said.
"We will review HMIC's findings and recommendations carefully to see how they can inform this work, and respond in due course."
Have you been affected by the issues in this story? You can email haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk with your experience. Please include a telephone number if you are willing to be contacted by a BBC journalist.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Vulnerable children 'held in cells'
Dengan url
http://sarapanoatmeal.blogspot.com/2015/03/vulnerable-children-held-in-cells.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Vulnerable children 'held in cells'
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Vulnerable children 'held in cells'
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar