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Departmental Suppliers
Mrs. Roche: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to ensure that his Department identifies the size of its suppliers by the number of their employees. [15606]
Mr. Howard: The Home Office is taking forward a Treasury recommendation for measuring the volume of business placed with small to medium enterprises. We are planning for our financial systems to have the capacity to record the size of suppliers by the number of their employees. The first of these systems is being introduced on 1 April 1996. Consideration is being given to how information about company size can best be obtained from our suppliers.
Immigration
Mr. Marlow: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a further statement on the 64 cases covered in his answer of 3 December 1987, Official Report, column 682. [15876]
Mr. Kirkhope: Inquiries are being made and I shall write to my hon. Friend about the outcome.
Mr. Marlow: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the (a) arrivals and (b) departures from the Indian sub-continent of overseas residents indicating the balance between the two for each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [15843]
Mr. Kirkhope:
Information on arrivals in the United Kingdom of overseas residents from the Indian sub-continent in 1992-4 was given in my reply to my hon. Friend on 8 February, Official Report, column 304. Corresponding figures for 1990 and 1991 are 257,000 and 260,000 respectively. Data on overseas residents departing from the United Kingdom for the Indian sub-continent are not available.
20 Feb 1996 : Column: 88
Mr. Steen:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list each regulatory body for which he is responsible indicating for each the percentage of business people on the board. [15742]
Mr. Howard:
My Department is responsible for the following regulatory bodies:
There are no boards for licensing and inspection under the Animal (Scientific Procedures) Act, the Drugs Branch Inspectorate or for the Office of the Data Protection Registrar.
Mr. George Howarth:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what definition his Department uses for the term drug-related crime. [16053]
Mr. Sackville:
Drug-related crime is defined in paragraph 2.2 of the White Paper, "Tackling Drugs Together", a copy of which is in the Library. It encompasses any criminal activity which is committed either to fund or as a consequence of drug misuse.
Lady Olga Maitland:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he proposes to extend the length of the electronic monitoring trials; and if he will make a statement. [16715]
Mr. Howard:
Yes. As I told my hon. Friend the Member for Swindon (Mr. Coombs) in my answer of 7 November 1995, Official Report, columns 813-14, I have been considering a request from the Magistrates' Association to extend the length of the electronic monitoring trials into the next financial year. I agree with the association that it would be helpful to give courts more time to become used to the curfew order, and for it to find its place among other community sentences.
The present trials are currently due to end in April this year and I am proposing to extend them until March 1997. We will also consult interested parties about increasing the number of courts in Greater Manchester and Berkshire, which will have the sentence available to them.
Mr. Morgan:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what guidelines govern the minimum animal welfare and research ethic standards to be applied to ponies used in research into (a) equine flu, (b) equine herpes and (c) surgery on broken limbs at the Animal Health Trust; and if he will make a statement. [14241]
20 Feb 1996 : Column: 89
Mr. Sackville
[holding answer 8 February 1996]: General guidance on the 1986 Act has been published as "Guidance on the Operation of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986" [1990: HC182].
Mr. Hawksley:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what investigation he is conducting into the possible use of pepper sprays by police in Britain. [15718]
Mr. Maclean:
The Home Office police scientific development branch keeps abreast of the results of all relevant research being undertaken into pepper spray. At this stage, my right hon. and learned Friend considers that not enough is known about the health effects of pepper spray for it to be used by the police in this country.
Mr. Hoon:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if the MI5 audit on the unified incident report and alerting system will be made public. [15406]
Mr. Howard:
It is not Government policy to publish reports produced under the unified information technology incident reporting and alert scheme, UNIRAS. The scheme relates to the monitoring of incidents which may affect the secure operation of information technology systems handling Government information.
Mr. Nigel Jones:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many people have been arrested; what charges have been brought against them; what convictions have been obtained; and what penalties have been imposed under each of the public order provisions of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. [15426]
Mr. Maclean:
Separate statistics on arrests by offence groups are not available centrally. Information on court proceedings data under the public order provisions of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 will not be available until autumn 1996.
Mr. Jones:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the public order provisions of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. [15427]
Mr. Maclean:
Sections 61 to 69 of the 1994 Act and sections 14A to 14C of the Public Order Act 1986, as amended by sections 70 and 71 of the 1994 Act, provide the police with powers to deal with trespassers on land, certain types of raves, disruptive trespassers and trespassory assemblies. Officials are closely monitoring the effectiveness of these measures. It is too early to reach firm conclusions about how the powers are working in practice, although I have received some favourable reports.
For the most part, offences under these sections are committed only where there is a failure to comply with a police direction to leave the land or where there is a failure to comply with a direction not to proceed to a rave
20 Feb 1996 : Column: 90
or a trespassory assembly. Statistics on court proceedings for offences under the relevant sections will not be available until autumn 1996.
Mr. Worthington:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many prisoners convicted of crimes related to Northern Ireland terrorism are currently held in special security units in Britain; [14676]
Miss Widdecombe
[holding answer 14 February 1996]: Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the temporary Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.
Sixty-seven per cent. of the commissioners on the Commission for Racial Equality and 40 per cent. of the members of the Gaming Board are business people.
The Commission for Racial Equality
The Drugs Branch Inspectorate
The Gaming Board for Great Britain
Licensing and inspection under the Animal (Scientific Procedures) Act
Office of the Data Protection Registrar
(2) if he will list (a) the number of prisoners convicted of crimes relating to Northern Irish terrorism currently in prison in Britain, (b) the length of the sentence of each of the prisoners and (c) how many years of their sentences each has already served. [14789]
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