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Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many justices of the peace are aged (a) under 30 years, (b) under 40 years, (c) under 50 years, (d) under 60 years (e) over 60 years.
Mr. John M. Taylor : This information can be supplied only at disproportionate cost. The aim of the advisory committees which advise the Lord Chancellor and the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster on the appointment of justices of the peace is to find as many candidates as possible under the age of 55, and particularly those in their 30s and 40s, in order to maintain a balanced age structure.
Mr. Dafis : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will make it his policy to propose amendments to current legislation in order to secure that any commitment to buy or sell a house made orally, or in writing, is legally enforceable in England and Wales.
Mr. John M. Taylor : The law already allows any house buyer and seller to enter into a binding contract once the terms of that contract have been agreed. The Government do not propose to alter the legal requirement that contracts for the sale or other disposition of an interest in land shall be made in writing.
Mr. Cox : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department when he expects to publish his Department's proposals for the reorganisation of the magistrates courts service in outer London ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. John M. Taylor : A consultation paper on the future geographical and structural organisation of the magistrates' courts service in the Greater London area will be published by my Department next month. decisions will be made following the three-month consultation period in the light of responses received.
Mr. Boateng : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what proposals he has received for removing the necessity for defendants to be represented at unopposed adjournment hearings in the magistrates courts ; and what estimate he has made of the savings that might thereby be achieved.
Mr. John M. Taylor : The Law Society has made such a proposal. The Lord Chancellor will be considering how best to take it forward. Estimates of the likely financial effect will be produced in the course of that consideration.
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Mr. Hoon : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what plans the Lord Chancellor's Department has to promote the development of law centres.
Mr. John M. Taylor : Law centres are primarily a local service and as such their development is primarily a local concern. However, the Legal Aid Board and the Law Centres Federation have recently established a working party to examine ways in which new arrangements could be made for the payment of legal aid work by law centres and other agencies which employ solicitors involved in providing advice, assistance and representation.
Mr. Robert Banks : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what is the amount of legal aid paid out in North Yorkshire for each of the last four years ; and if he will give the number of cases supported in each of those years.
Mr. John M. Taylor : I refer my hon. Friend to the replies I gave to the hon. Member for York (Mr. Bayley), on 20 January, at columns 261-62. North Yorkshire is covered by two Legal Aid Board area offices at Newcastle -upon-Tyne and at Leeds. It is not possible to distinguish between assisted persons residing in North Yorkshire and other areas served by those offices.
Mr. Boateng : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what proposals he has received for cost penalties to be imposed on legal aid matrimonial litigants when their
non-co-operation has led to delays occasioning increased costs ; and what estimate he has made of the savings that might thereby be achieved.
Mr. John M. Taylor : The Law Society has made such a proposal, which it acknowledges needs further thought. Estimates of the likely financial effect will be produced in due course.
Mr. Boateng : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what proposals he has received to limit the availability of legal aid for the costs of (a) counsel being attended by a solicitors' representative and (b) two counsel when a QC is assigned ; and what estimate he has made of the savings that might thereby be achieved.
Mr. John M. Taylor : The Law Society has made such proposals, though they have been under consideration in the efficiency commission for some time and it has hitherto been difficult to secure any restraint on costs as a result. The Lord Chancellor will be considering how best to take these proposals forward. Estimates of the likely financial effect will be produced in the course of that consideration.
Mr. Boateng : To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what proposals his Department has received for fees for legal work to remain at the levels set in April 1992 ; and what estimate he has made of the savings that might thereby be achieved.
Mr. John M. Taylor : Both the General Council of the Bar and the Law Society have proposed that the statutory
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rates for legal aid work in 1993-94 should remain at 1992-93 levels. This proposal formed part of a series of measures put forward by the professions as an alternative to measures to control legal aid expenditure announced by the Lord Chancellor. However, as the Lord Chancellor had not intended to propose an uprating for 1993-94 the professions' proposal would not achieve any savings other than those already considered by the Lord Chancellor.Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will review rules of evidence procedures, exchange of statutory requirements and court procedures in order to provide better protection of witnesses who are called to aid the prosecution of violent offenders.
Mr. Jack : A number of safeguards have been introduced to protect victims and other witnesses from intimidation or fear of intimidation. These include measures to prevent an individual's address appearing as a matter of course on witness statements ; to delay, except in certain circumstances, disclosure of the address until the start of summary trial, full committal or Crown court trial ; to allow child witnesses to give evidence in certain cases by closed-circuit television and to allow a video recording of an earlier investigative interview with a child witness to be accepted as evidence in chief ; and to provide anonymity for victims of rape and other specified sexual offences. The operation of these, and other, safeguards is kept under general review, but we have no present plans for a more formal exercise.
Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what figures he has on the level of offenders re-offending while on bail, for the latest convenient period.
Mr. Jack : Such figures are not held centrally. Our research indicates that although the absolute number of offences committed by people on bail has risen by about 26,000 between 1985 and 1990, as the number of people granted bail has increased, the proportion of those found guilty of offences committed while they were on bail has remained at about 10 to 12 per cent.--"Offending whilst on bail : a survey of recent studies", Home Office research and planning unit paper 65, February 1992.
The incidence of offending on bail is a matter of concern and work is in hand to tackle the problem. This includes action research which is being undertaken in five areas and is designed to identify the scope for improving the bail decision-taking process, and thus minimising the risk of offending on bail.
Mr. Vaz : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what asssessment he has made of the effects of reductions in funding of Leicestershire police force on the number of posts and the level of overtime ; and what representations he has received on the subject.
Mr. Charles Wardle : The force is currently holding 29 vacancies against an authorised establishment of 1,853.
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Overtime levels have been reduced as part of measures to keep within budgetary constraints. No representations have been received on this subject.Mr. McNamara : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many of the prisoners transferred between 1982 and 1992 from prisons in Northern Ireland to prisons in Great Britain were convicted of scheduled offences.
Mr. Peter Lloyd : Information on the nature of the offences of prisoners transferred between United Kindom jurisdictions is not held centrally.
I will write to the hon. Gentleman with the information requested.
Ms. Walley : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when an application for entry clearance made on 2 July 1992 to the Islamabad high commission can be processed ; what is the average waiting time for an interview with the immigration service ; and how long the average waiting time is for the report to be sent to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and for a decision to be made.
Mr. Charles Wardle : Where the entry clearance officer refers an application for inquiries in the United Kingdom by the immigration service, these inquiries should normally be completed within three months of receipt. If the hon. Member is concerned about the time taken to deal with any individual case, I shall be willing to look into it.
Mr. Winnick : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received from the new United States Administration concerning inquiries undertaken by his Department over whether Mr. Clinton had applied for United Kingdom citizenship.
Sir John Wheeler : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he can report progress on his plans for the independent review of prisoners' complaints.
Mr. Kenneth Clarke : I am pleased to announce that I have now agreed arrangements to appoint a prisons ombudsman to consider grievances from prisoners who have failed to obtain satisfaction from the present internal complaints system. He or she will have a wide remit to consider issues affecting individual prisoners. It will extend to grievances relating to contracted out prisons. It will not include complaints about non-prison bodies--the courts, the police and the Parole Board for example.
The prisons ombudsman will be able to consider the merits of cases as well as the procedures involved. He or she will make recommendations to the chief executive of the Prison Service, and to myself as necessary. The ombudsman will publish an annual report which will be laid before the House.
I will look to the prisons ombudsman to maintain good liaison with Her Majesty's chief inspector of prisons and
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with the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration. The rights of prisoners to approach the latter through a Member of Parliament will of course be unaffected by this new appointment. The post will be publicly advertised shortly. My aim is to announce an appointment in the spring in order to have the new office operating and considering grievances by the end of this year.Dr. Lynne Jones : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what analysis he has made of the benefits arising out of the operation of the scheme that gives tax relief for mortgage interest payments and of whether this represents value for the revenue forgone when compared with the cost of a scheme of universal housing benefits.
Mr. Dorrell : We keep the costs and benefits of all tax reliefs under continuous review. Mortgage interest relief helps some 9.8 million borrowers to buy their own homes, and is estimated to cost £5.2 billion in 1992-93.
Mr. Bayley : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what are the tax revenue implications of the target to reduce the consumption of cigarettes by at least 40 per cent. by the year 2000 in the Department of Health White Paper, "Health of the Nation".
Sir John Cope : As part of the "Health of the Nation" commitment to reduce the consumption of cigarettes, the Government have undertaken at least to maintain the real level of taxes on tobacco products. A 40 per cent. fall in consumption of tobacco products would produce a 40 per cent. fall in the tobacco excise duty base. For the present real level of excise duties on tobacco products, this would represent an annual loss to the Exchequer of around £2.4 billion, in 1992-93 prices.
Mr. Kilfoyle : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer at what rate he intends to tax the national lottery.
Sir John Cope : My right hon. Friend will make an announcement about the rate in due course.
Mr. Barry Field : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he expects purdah to commence for Treasury Ministers in advance of the autumn Budget.
Mr. Lamont : I shall be deciding that in due course.
Mr. Robert Hughes : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what has been the income to the Treasury in each of the last five years as a result of VAT levied on registered charities.
Sir John Cope : Information about the amount of VAT borne by charities is not collated centrally, but it is estimated that charities now pay up to £250 million in VAT each year.
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Mr. Meacher : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list those countries, for each of the last 10 years, where International Monetary Fund conditionality has been imposed for receipt of United Kingdom unilateral aid.
Mr. Lennox-Boyd [holding answer 11 January 1993] : It is not possible to list all those occasions on which individual British aid commitments were made in association with International Monetary Fund reform programmes. But British balance of payments aid is usually provided only to countries that have programmes of structural adjustment agreed with the International Monetary Fund and the World bank in place. In doing so, we often act in concert with other donors. The objective is to enable recipients to purchase urgently needed imports to sustain or improve production and assist economic recovery. Commitments of such aid in each of the last 10 years for which figures are available were made to the following countries : 1982
Sudan
Zaire
Jamaica
Bangladesh
Pakistan
1983
Kenya
Sudan
Uganda
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Jamaica
Bangladesh
1984
Ghana
Malawi
Sudan
Uganda
Zaire
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Jamaica
Bangladesh
Maldives
1985
Ghana
Mozambique
Somalia
Sudan
Zimbabwe
Bangladesh
Jamaica
1986
Gambia
Ghana
Mozambique
Somalia
Tanzania
Zaire
Zambia
Bangladesh
Jamaica
1987
Gambia
Ghana
Mozambique
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