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3 Feb 2003 : Column 70W—continued
Child Pornography
Ms Shipley: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what discussions he has had with banks and credit card companies to request (a) that they proactively seek out child pornography sites, (b) that they take action to prevent their credit cards and other financial facilities being used to pay for child pornography and (c) that they report the details of customers who attempt to pay for internet child pornography by credit card to the police. [91975]
Hilary Benn: Those who view child pornography, particularly those who pay to do so, should be clear that they fuel the demand for those images. This demand
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undeniably leads to actual abuse of children, sometimes as young as four or five, in the United Kingdom and abroad.
The payment card companies have been working on this issue for some time and work closely with the police. More recently, they have begun dialogue with the Children's Charities Coalition for Internet Safety, which they hope will lead to a joint statement. In addition, the use of payment cards in relation to child pornography is an area United Kingdom and overseas police are focussing on as a means of investigating those who supply and those who consume child pornography.
The answer to my hon. Friend's specific questions are as follows:
(a) The International Card Schemes, on behalf of the wider banking industry, monitor websites working together with law enforcement agencies around the world. In particular, Visa has a unit which scans the internet to identify websites that accept credit or debit cards and contain child pornography.
(b) United Kingdom financial institutions that provide facilities to merchants take precautions to ensure they do not do business with merchants distributing illegal material. If they discover that a merchant is engaged in such business, they terminate the relationship and contact law enforcement.
(c) Normally it will not be apparent from the information received by the card issuers that the transaction relates to illegal business. However, where a card issuer becomes aware that a customer has been conducting illegal business using their card, they will alert law enforcement. The card issuers also fully co-operate with the police when approached for information or assistance.
Co-ordinated action by the major credit card schemes can have a major impact on the commercial trade in child pornography, but this can only be effective if all the schemes are equally involved. We welcome the efforts they have made so far and will continue to work with them to make this as effective as possible.
Ms Shipley: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many people have been arrested in the course of Operation Ore; and how many have been charged. [93480]
Hilary Benn: I understand that 5,700 of the United Kingdom Operation Ore suspects are being investigated by Home Office police forces (the remainder are being investigated by Scottish Forces, Police Service of Northern Ireland and the island forces). In relation to those suspects, as of 23 January 2003, 1,512 searches have been carried out and 1,336 arrests have been made. 189 individuals have been charged.
All forces have prioritised those suspects who have access to children at home or at work and those in sensitive occupations. Typically, computer equipment is seized during the search of suspects' addresses. The capacity to forensically examine the volume of computer data accumulated by these suspects is limited and the Government has provided an additional £500,000 for training and equipment for forces to build capacity for this kind of operation. This Government has provided record funding for police forces and has
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established child protection as a priority in the National Policing Plan. It is for Chief Constables and police authorities to improve the quality of their child protection units within those resources. The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and Ministers are continuing to monitor progress.
Conviction Data
Mr. Paice: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the performance of each constabulary in recording conviction data on the police national computer under the court results 90 per cent. data targets for the latest month available. [90306]
Mr. Denham [holding answer 14 January 2003]: The particular data to which the hon. Member refers relates to recording not only convictions but all court results. It shows the time taken from the completion of court proceedings to record the quickest 90 per cent. of cases entered during the period in question. The data reflects the longest time taken to record any case within the quickest 90 per cent. The figures include the time taken by courts to notify results to the police, and will be affected by factors such as delays due to a need to clarify results, or undertaking back record conversion exercises.
The following table shows the results for forces in England and Wales in December 2002. The average figure for the nine-month period from April to December 2002 was 71 days. This compares with an average of 220 days for the period from April 2000 to March 2001, and of 196 days for the period between April 2001 to March 2002.
We have made clear our determination that the timeliness of inputting data onto the police national computer should be improved. Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) reported (Police National Computer Data Quality and Timeliness—Second Report December 2002) that substantial progress had been made following the inspection and review exercise that we commissioned, but that more needed to be done. To this end, we are working with the Association of Chief Police Officers to implement HMIC's recommendations.
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Criminal Records Bureau
Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many ex-gratia payments have been made by the Criminal Records Bureau to customers because of maladministration. [91776]
Hilary Benn [holding answer 20 January 2003]: The Criminal Records Bureau has made 225 ex-gratia payments to customers because of maladministration.
Custodial Sentences (Women)
Simon Hughes: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many women received a custodial sentence in each of the last five years; what the average length of sentence was in each year; and what proportion were imprisoned for offences of violence in each year. [93295]
Hilary Benn: The information requested is contained in the table.
| Sentenced to immediate custody for all offences | Average custodial sentence length (months)(9) | Proportion sentenced for violent offences(8) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Percentage | |||
| 1997 | 5,506 | 9.8 | 12.9 |
| 1998 | 6,567 | 9.0 | 12.1 |
| 1999 | 7,504 | 8.9 | 11.2 |
| 2000 | 7,900 | 9.1 | 11.8 |
| 2001 | 8,061 | 10.4 | 12.2 |
(8) Offences of violence against the person, sexual offences and robbery
(9) Excluding life
Figures for 2002 are not yet available.
Entitlement Card
Miss McIntosh: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what measures have been taken to publicise the entitlement card consultation. [93490]
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Beverley Hughes: My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made a statement to the House when the consultation paper was published on 3 July 2002, Official Report, column 227. A press release was also published at the time and there was considerable coverage in the national and regional broadcast and print media.
During the consultation period the Home Office has published four further press releases to coincide with Ministerial events. There was also widespread print media reporting and coverage on Sky News of the Home Secretary's speech to a conference on entitlement cards organised by the Information Commissioner on 15 January 2003. The Home Office press office has responded to many requests for briefing by national, local and specialist media.
400 regional press packs were distributed to local broadcast and print media organisations throughout the UK to encourage them to run debates on their programmes or in their publications. Ministers accepted 10 invitations to debate the issues on local radio programmes and discussed the issue on feature programmes on Channel Four and BBC Radio 2. I also took part in a live webcast on BBC News Online.
In addition to media activities to raise general public awareness, considerable effort has been devoted to providing information to key stakeholder organisations through officials preparing special summaries of the consultation paper, holding face-to-face meetings and giving presentations at conferences.
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