Former YJB director made to drop police and crime commissioner bid

Bob Ashford, who was standing for the position in Avon and Somerset, stepped down after the Home Office and the Electoral Commission confirmed that youth convictions for imprisonable offences bar people from running.

Ashford said he was convicted of trespassing and possession of an offensive weapon as a 13-year-old in 1966. In a statement on his website he said the incident happened at a railway embankment where a group of boys he was with were shooting an air rifle at cans. He claims not to have touched the rifle but was advised to plead guilty at the time.

Ashford described the legislation governing police and crime commissioner candidacy as “absolutely flawed and an infringement of the rights of young people”.

“I have spent my entire life working with young people who have been in the care of the local authority or involved in the justice system,” he said. 

“The foundation of that work has been the recognition that every individual has worth and the ability to change their lives. It is ironic that after a professional and political career spanning my entire life I am now going to be brought down by a piece of legislation which absolutely contradicts those tenets.”

From November, police and crime commissioners will be responsible for local policing. They will take charge of large pots of public money, including some that currently goes straight to youth offending teams.

Ashford was one of two senior figures with links to the YJB to put themselves forward as a potential candidate for the police and crime commissioner role. Alan Billings, who sits on the board of the YJB, features on the Labour candidates’ shortlist for South Yorkshire.

Plans to wipe clean criminal records for young offenders at 18 were mooted in the government’s Breaking the Cycle green paper, but the idea has not been taken any further.