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Criminal Justice System

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what targets and performance indicators he has set to meet his Department's objective of tackling attrition in the criminal justice system; [158951]

(2) what is his baseline and what are his targets and performance indicators to meet his Department's objective of achieving a reasonable reduction in attrition. [159937]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The Public Service Agreement for the whole criminal justice system, agreed in last year's Spending Review, included a target of increasing the number and proportion of recorded crimes for which an offender is brought to justice. ("Brought to justice" means that an offender has been cautioned, has an offence taken into consideration by the courts in passing sentence, or is convicted of an offence). In "Criminal Justice: The Way Ahead", we indicated that, specifically, there will be a criminal justice system-wide target to increase, by 2004, the number of recorded crimes ending in an offender being brought to justice by 100,000. In 1999-2000, 1,270,000 offences were brought to justice, which represented 24 per cent. of the 5,301,000 crimes recorded in that year.

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what targets he has set to improve the satisfaction of (a) victims and (b) witnesses with the criminal justice system. [159025]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The current target for both victim and witness satisfaction is a five percentage point improvement by March 2002.

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he intends to publish his Department's research findings on public confidence in the criminal justice system. [159026]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The findings of the 2000 British Crime Survey on confidence in the criminal justice system were published on 31 January 2001. A copy of Home Office Research, Development and Statistics Directorate Research Findings No. 137: Confidence in the Criminal Justice System: Findings from the 2000 British Crime Survey was deposited in the Library following publication.

Organised Crime

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will place in the Library a copy of the report prepared for his Department by Professor Michael Levi on laws to combat organised crime. [158950]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The Government have undertaken in "Criminal Justice--The Way Ahead" (Cm 5074) to consider whether there is a need to introduce a new offence to cover organised criminal conspiracy. Professor Michael Levi was commissioned by the Home Office last year to study the experience of

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countries that had already introduced such offences. A summary of the report is being prepared by officials and will be published later this year. Copies of this summary will be placed in the Library.

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is his (a) baseline and (b) target for the disruption of organised criminal enterprises. [159029]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The Home Office Public Service Agreement sets a target of disrupting 10 per cent. more organised criminal enterprises by 2004. The baseline figure will be the number of such groups disrupted during 2000-01, which is currently being determined.

Prisoner Activity

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the average number of hours of purposeful activity per prisoner per week (a) in 2000-01 and (b) at the most recent date for which figures are available. [158933]

Mr. Boateng: The average number of purposeful activity hours per prisoner per week in 2000-01 was 23.8 hours. The average rate during March 2001 was 24.5 hours. The data for March are provisional and subject to validation by prisons.

"Living without Fear"

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the projects currently being funded by his Department in order to implement the action points of "Living without Fear", indicating the objective, expected duration and cost to public funds of each such project. [159014]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The Government's 1999 policy and awareness raising publication, "Living without Fear", set out information on domestic violence and other aspects of violence against women, with examples of the innovative interventions then under way to address them. It was designed as a basis for the future development of policy and described the measures the Government had themselves already undertaken, those they had in hand and those they were committed to taking. A number of these measures were to ensure that relevant issues were properly taken into account in general policy rather than being specifically and exclusively directed at violence against women. Current projects that are so directed are those within the Violence against Women Initiative of the Crime Reduction Programme, and information on them is given in a table which has been placed in the Library.

Criminal Justice Act (Costs)

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he intends to publish a report under section 95 of the Criminal Justice Act 1991 on costs. [158931]

Mr. Charles Clarke: Data are currently being collected and a report prepared on costs. Subject to trilateral agreement between the criminal justice agencies, we hope to publish the report before the end of the year.

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Statutory Time Limits (Pilots)

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the progress of statutory time limits pilots. [158928]

Mr. Charles Clarke: Piloting of statutory time limits began on 1 November 1999 in youth courts in six areas. The pilots are being evaluated by independent researchers from the University of Sheffield. The evaluation is in progress and is expected to be completed at the end of the year.

Probation Service

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the figures (a) nationally and (b) for each probation area for the number and proportion of cases under supervision by the Probation Service where breach action was taken in accordance with national standards in 2000-01. [158934]

Mr. Boateng: The figures for compliance with the national standard on breach are provided by the Association of Chief Officers of Probation audit of probation areas and are shown in the table. This gives the results of the most recent audit. The audit covers supervision of probation orders, community service orders (as community punishment orders and community rehabilitation orders were at the time) and licence cases only. The national totals show that breach action was taken in 65 per cent. of cases in accordance with national standards; in a further five per cent. of cases, management authorisation not to breach was given, also in line with national standards.

Offenders breached

Area	Number breached	Percentage
Avon	45	83.3
Bedfordshire	13	76.5
Berkshire	3	37.5
Cambridgeshire	18	64.3
Cheshire	27	69.2
Cornwall	4	100
Cumbria	25	80.6
Derbyshire	41	75.9
Devon	23	54.8
Dorset	19	86.4
Durham	22	95.7
Dyfed	3	100
East Sussex	21	75
Essex	19	79.2
Gloucestershire	18	62.1
Greater Manchester	67	68.4
Gwent	14	87.5
Hampshire	39	69.6
Hereford and Worcs	14	73.7
Hertfordshire	12	85.7
Humberside	46	65.7
ILPS	52	36.9
Kent	17	31.5
Lancashire	60	85.7
Leicestershire	38	80.1
Lincolnshire	24	96
Merseyside	68	79.1
Mid Glamorgan	12	66.7
Middlesex	33	45.8
NELPS	31	66.0

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Crime (Economic Costs)

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what targets he (a) has set and (b) plans to set for reducing the economic costs of crime. [159019]

Mr. Charles Clarke: The Public Service Agreement (PSA) for the Criminal Justice System commits Criminal Justice Departments to reduce the economic and social costs of crime by March 2004.

There are a wide range of economic and social costs associated with crime, not all of which are easy to measure, but the Criminal Justice Departments have jointly developed an indicator of the economic and social costs of crime as part of the PSA commitment. The methodology used to measure the economic and social cost of crime was published in a report in December 2000, "The economic and social costs of crime" (Home Office Research Study 217). This sets out clearly how the figures have been derived and estimates the total economic and social cost of crime to England and Wales in 1999-2000 to be £60 billion.

Work is ongoing to develop and improve the estimates as part of the process of monitoring progress in meeting this PSA commitment.

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