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Corporate Manslaugher

Mr. Dismore: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the regulatory impact assessment concerning the proposed new offence of corporate manslaughter has been completed; and if he will make a statement. [125049]

Paul Goggins [holding answer 11 July 2003]: The results of the Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) are still being assessed but the preliminaryvindications are that the costs of a change in the lawbwill not be large. As made clear in the RIA, no new burdens will be placed on companies in terms of the standards with which they will be legally required toncomply. That RIA results may need to be refined to reflect any changes to the original proposals.

Mr. Dismore: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department which industries in the private sector were selected for the regulatory impact assessment for
 
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the new offence of corporate manslaughter; on what basis such industries were selected; and if he will make a statement. [125050]

Paul Goggins [holding answer 11 July 2003]: The Regulatory Impact Assessment was based upon a survey (conducted in September 2002) of different sectors of private industry. These included the construction sector, the mining and quarrying sector, the transport sector, and others. We did not contact companies directly, but through their representative organisations.

Mr. Dismore: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what his policy is in relation to (a) Crown immunity and (b) who should conduct prosecution inquiries in relation to the proposed offence of corporate manslaughter; and if he will make a statement. [125051]

Paul Goggins [holding answer 11 July 2003]: My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary announced on the 20 May that firm proposals for legislation on corporate killing will be published before the end of this year. The   position of Crown bodies and the issue of who should investigate and prosecute, will be issues for consideration. No decisions have yet been made.

Criminal Records Bureau

Mr. Hawkins: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what financial support is provided by Government to the Criminal Records Bureau; when the Bureau expects to become self-financing; and what impact he estimates self-financing may have on future fee levels for disclosure certificates. [122485]

Paul Goggins: In 2003–04 the Home Office, Department of Health and Department for Education and Skills are expected to contribute £18.8 million towards the £75 million cost of the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB); the remainder will be met from fee income. Further funding by the three Departments will be provided in 2004–05. The CRB is expected to become self-funding from 2005–06. The fees for Disclosures are reviewed annually. Decisions on any fee increase for future years will be taken in the light of the then best estimates of the costs of the Disclosure service and the level of demand.

Mr. Hawkins: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the timetable is for taking forward the recommendations of the Independent Review of the Criminal Records Bureau. [122486]

Paul Goggins: Work is progressing on implementing the Independent Review Team's 10 recommendations. As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made clear in his written statement on 27 February 2003, Official Report, columns 32–36WS, a number of the recommendations are dependent on primary legislation while others are linked to the re-negotiation of the contract with Capita. Amendments to Part 5 of the Police Act 1997, under which the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) operates, have now been incorporated into the Criminal Justice Bill (recommendations 1, 2, 3, 4 and 10). The contract renegotiations with Capita are ongoing and we expect to conclude them by late autumn (recommendations 1 and 7). The CRB is on course to pilot the electronic submission of applications by the
 
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end of the year (recommendation 3) and is currently piloting an electronic database to 'flag' the existence of local police intelligence (recommendation 5). We are considering the results of the consultation on the Review Team's proposal (recommendation 6) that applications for Basic Disclosures should be routed through a registered body. We expect to issue a consultation paper by the end of July on whether applicants for the most sensitive positions should be required to submit their fingerprints with their Disclosure application (recommendation 8). An announcement on establishing the CRB as a separate Agency will be made soon (recommendation 9).

Mr. McNamara: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what estimate he has made of the revenue gained as a result of the proposed increase to disclosure fees for standard and enhanced disclosures by the Criminal Records Bureau. [122768]

Paul Goggins: The estimated revenue gained as a result of the increase in Criminal Records Bureau disclosure fees for the period 1 July 2003 to 31 March 2004 is £29.5 million. Total revenue from fees in 2003–04 is estimated to be £56.2 million, with the Home Office, Department of Health and Department for Education and Skills contributing the balance, of £18.8 million, towards the £75 million cost of the Bureau.

Departmental Staff

Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has for redeployment of members of his Department out of London and the South East. [125390]

Fiona Mactaggart: The scope for relocating Government activity is being considered by Sir Michael Lyons. His independent review was announced in the Chancellor's Budget statement on 9 April.

Details of the review, including the consultation launched on 19 June, can be found on Her Majesty's Treasury website at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk. Sir Michael will report his findings on the scope for relocating Departments and other public sector bodies before the end of the year.

DNA Database

Simon Hughes: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what proportion of those recorded on the national DNA database has a criminal conviction. [124972]

Paul Goggins: The proportion of individuals recorded on the National DNA database who have a criminal conviction is 95 per cent.

Drugs

Mr. Jim Cunningham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many class A drug supply offenders there are for every 10,000 residents in (a) the UK, (b) the west midlands and (c) Coventry; [126048]

(2) how many people were convicted of class A drug supply offences for every 10,000 residents in 2002   in (a) the UK, (b) the west midlands and (c) Coventry. [126049]

 
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Caroline Flint: The number of Class A drug offenders is not known. We do have information on the number of offenders brought to justice in England and Wales, though not at constituency level. 630 offenders were brought to justice in the west midlands police force area for Class A drug supply offences in 2000, and 8,409 such offenders in England and Wales in the same period.

Using current population estimates for 2000, 2.41 offenders per 10,000 residents in the west midlands police force area were brought to justice for Class A supply offences in that year. In England and Wales, 1.59 offenders per 10,000 residents were brought to justice.

Mr. Steinberg: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what percentage of defendants sentenced to a drugs treatment and testing order re-offended during the currency of the order in each year since it was introduced. [122121]

Paul Goggins: It is too soon for validated information about re-offending since national roll-out of the order in October 2000. It is currently impossible to differentiate between offences committed prior to the commencement of the order and those committed after the order was made.

A one-year reconviction study of offenders in the pilot areas will be published shortly and I will send the hon. Member a copy as soon as it is available.

Mr. Best: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to increase the number of offenders with drug problems who enter treatment. [125108]

Caroline Flint: The Government fully recognises the need to focus the Criminal Justice system towards drug misusing offenders and has set out measures to use the criminal justice system to engage drug-misusing offenders, driving them into treatment and out of crime.

Those measures constitute the Criminal Justice Interventions Programme which aims to ensure that while individual Interventions such as Arrest Referral, Drug Testing, Drug Treatment and Testing Orders, are expanded, there is a step-change in interventions delivering an end-to-end system for drug misusing offenders. These measures will work in parallel with appropriate treatment interventions to establish an integrated care pathway.

Government funding on treatment services for drug misusers will rise from £438 million to £503 million by 2003–04. The National Treatment Agency has several initiatives underway to increase the capacity of the treatment sector and reduce waiting times, and the updated Drug Strategy is currently on track to double capacity, by 2008, with 200,000 problem drug users to be treated each year.

The Updated Drug Strategy, which provides for a wider programme of targeted interventions, includes making the Drug Treatment and Testing Order available to as many drug misusing offenders as possible within existing capacity levels and taking into account predicted growth within the treatment and Criminal Justice sectors.
 
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