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HOME DEPARTMENT
"Picking up the Pieces"
Mr. Brake: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the Picking up the Pieces III report from local authorities dated 11 to 13 January. [97273]
Mr. Mike O'Brien: The Home Office broadly supports the work this group is undertaking to develop better post-disaster psycho-social care arrangements.
Drug-related Crime
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what range of national initiatives Her Majesty's Government have employed to reduce drug-related crime since 1997.A [94523]
Mr. Charles Clarke [pursuant to his reply, 19 October 1999, c.436]: One of the four Key Aims of the Government's drugs strategy is to protect communities from drug related crime. National initiatives introduced since 1997 include the piloting of the new Drug Treatment and Testing Order, for which around £60 million has been earmarked for national roll-out from next year; the Prison Service has been given £76 million over the next three years for tackling drug misuse in prisons, of which in the region of £60 million has been allocated to drug treatment programmes, and up to £20 million over the next three years is being made available to assist in the development of arrest referral schemes to get drug misusing offenders into treatment.
Travellers
Mr. Clappison: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he expects to announce the results of his examination of guidance on the exercise of powers under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 by the DETR and his Department relating to travellers. [97384]
Mr. Charles Clarke: My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has asked for the good practice document "Managing Unauthorised Camping", published jointly by the Home Office and the Department for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR) in 1998, to be reviewed. This is being carried forward with the DETR and the results will be announced in due course.
Asylum and Immigration
Mr. Jim Marshall: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what options are available to visitors to the UK who are refused entry and who have no right of appeal against the decision; what steps are taken to make such visitors and their sponsors in the UK aware of those options before they are required to leave the country; and if it is the practice to stamp passports with a symbol indicating that entry has been refused before the visitor has had the opportunity to exercise such options. [97446]
Mrs. Roche:
A person seeking entry as a visitor, but refused leave to enter is informed in writing that they may contact their High Commission or Consul or anyone else they think may be able to help them. A chief immigration officer will consider any representations made before a
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person's departure. It is normal practice to endorse the passport of a person refused leave to enter at the time the decision is made.
Mr. Hilary Benn:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will issue guidance to police forces about sharing information with local housing authorities about persons with previous convictions for burglary who are applying for local authority housing so that those authorities can consider whether to make an offer of accommodation; and if he will make a statement. [97036]
Mr. Charles Clarke:
Under Part VI of the Housing Act 1996, local housing authorities are required to have an allocation scheme which sets out their procedures and priorities for allocating social housing. There are a number of classes of household or person who must be given "reasonable preference" under an allocation scheme. This framework is designed to ensure that priority for subsidised housing is given to those with the greatest need.
Authorities have the power to define which classes of people are eligible for local authority housing. When deciding which classes of people should be non-qualifying, they are entitled to decide on the basis of objective criteria and evidence, whether granting a tenancy to a person is likely to result in disruption to the stability of the community.
The Department for the Environment, Transport and the Regions' "Code of Guidance for Local Authorities on the Allocation of Accommodation and Homelessness", which will be published shortly, will recommend that any decision to exclude classes of persons on the grounds of the need to protect the community or reduce levels of crime on an estate should be taken in consultation with relevant organisations in the criminal justice system, in particular the police and probation services.
We shall consider the need for further guidance on the disclosure of information by the police if necessary.
Mr. Llew Smith:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to amend the draft Freedom of Information Bill to accommodate commitments on environmental information disclosure contained in EU directives and the Aarhus Convention on Access to Environmental Information. [97364]
Mr. Mike O'Brien:
The consultation paper on the draft Freedom of Information Bill (published 24 May 1999) set out the Government's intention to modify as necessary the general right of access in the Freedom of Information Bill in order to implement the Aarhus Convention (United Nations Economic Commission for Europe Convention on access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters) insofar as it relates to access to environmental information.
The Bill will now contain a provision giving power to the Secretary of State to make regulations to give effect to the Aarhus Convention as it relates to access to environmental information. Ministers have agreed to this
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change of approach. This will allow for the creation of a free-standing regime for environmental information which will give effect to the Aarhus Convention and the existing European Community Directive on Freedom of Access to Information on the Environment. The current regulations will be revoked.
Access to environmental information will, therefore, be given in the first instance under the regulations rather than the Bill itself. Freedom of Information legislation will continue to have an effect, however, by placing a duty on authorities to consider any discretion they may have to disclose information in the public interest where it is otherwise exempt under the regulations.
Mr. Neil Turner:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many claims made for compensation for the surrender of handguns and ammunition have (a) been settled and (b) remain outstanding; what has been the total compensation paid to date; and what the final figure is expected to be. [97545]
Mr. Charles Clarke:
As at the end of October, a total of 74,597 claims under the firearms compensation and ex gratia payment schemes had been paid. There are currently 966 claims outstanding, of which 800 are ones where payment offers have been made to the claimants in question and are awaiting acceptance. A total of £88.96 million has been paid out and the final figure is expected to be approximately £90 million.
Mr. Kidney:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what use has been made of restorative justice in response to motoring offences involving injury or loss to third parties. [96636]
Mr. Charles Clarke:
Where it judges it appropriate and proportional, a court can make a probation order for a motoring offence. Probation service motoring programmes typically include sessions on raising offenders' awareness of the impact on victims. Such programmes often include police or hospital staff presenting information about the impact and injuries resulting from motoring offences and the consequences for victims.
The Crime Reduction Programme announced last year, contains a restorative justice component. It is evaluating a number of existing restorative justice schemes in order to identify which elements or combination of elements are most effective in reducing crime and at what cost. Some of the schemes will include offenders who have committed motoring offences.
Dr. Cable:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the Government's policy is on the manufacture for sale abroad by UK companies of defence and security goods that are illegal in the UK; what action is taken against such companies; and if he will make a statement. [97483]
Mr. Charles Clarke:
The kinds of weapons used by military and security forces are prohibited under the provisions of section 5 of the Firearms Act 1968. This
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means that no company may manufacture such weapons without the written authority of the Secretary of State. In order to obtain such an authority, an applicant must show that there is a compelling reason for possessing prohibited weapons, that the applicant is fit to be entrusted with prohibited weapons and that they will be stored under conditions of security commensurate with the danger to the public posed by such weapons.
Authorities are carefully conditioned to restrict to the minimum genuinely needed, the numbers and types of prohibited weapons the authority holder is allowed to possess. They are also specifically conditioned to restrict the purposes for which the holder may possess prohibited weapons and how the weapons may be disposed of.
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