Measure is among series of proposed changes to justice secretary Ken Clarke's legal aid, sentencing and punishment billAlan Travis
guardian.co.uk,
Magistrates have hit out at the government's plan to extend the use of US-style mandatory sentences, including to juveniles, warning ministers that there will always be "rare or exceptional circumstances" in which they are not appropriate.
John Bache, the chairman of the Magistrates Association youth courts committee, said that while he agreed that removing knives from the streets was of paramount importance, the Magistrates Association was against mandatory sentences.
He said that, whatever the offence committed, youths lacked "the maturity of thought of adults and must be treated accordingly".
Bache's comments came in response to the proposal to introduce a mandatory four-month detention and training order for any 16 or 17-year-old caught using a knife in a threatening manner.
The proposal is part of a raft of sentencing changes that MPs will be asked to approve as amendments to Kenneth Clarke's legal aid, sentencing and punishment bill next week.
The other changes to the justice secretary's legislation include a "two strikes and you're out" mandatory life sentence for anyone convicted of a second serious sexual or violent crime and a move to extend mandatory life sentences to cover crimes other than murder for the first time.
The first "most serious sexual or violent offence" that will be covered by the "two strikes" policy will have to have carried a prison sentence of at least 10 years for the second conviction to trigger a life sentence.
The proposal to extend the mandatory life sentence for a first offence other than murder will include child sex offences, categories of terrorism and "causing or allowing the death of a child".
Clarke told the BBC the two strikes policy would apply to somebody who had committed two "probably near-murderous attacks".
The justice secretary appeared to suggest that the decision to extend the coverage of the mandatory life sentences to offences other than murder, such as child sex, would affect about 20 cases a year.
Ministry of Justice figures suggest the new mandatory minimum sentence for juvenile knife crime could affect a further 200 to 400 cases a year. A detailed impact assessment for the package is to be published shortly. The changes will not be applied retrospectively.
To read more click here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/oct/27/kenneth-clarke-two-strikes-life-sentencing
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