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2 Mar 2004 : Column 871W—continued
Court Proceedings (Adjournment)
John Cryer: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs if he will make an assessment of the impact on victims of crime of repeated adjournments of court proceedings at crown and magistrates' courts. [157332]
Mr. Leslie: In the Crown court close management of ineffective trials by courts and other Criminal Justice System agencies has resulted in a reduction to 17.8 per cent. in January 2004 from the baseline of 23 per cent. set last year. Progress in the magistrates court has been slower, but is still 1.5 per cent. better than the baseline, at 29.4 per cent. in January.
Interviews with victims of crime have found that the inconvenience and emotional upheaval each adjournment causes reduces the likelihood that the victim will attend the next time.
The Government are addressing the problem of ineffective trials through the Effective Trial Management Programme, which will ensure cases are ready on the trial date. In addition, on 4 February the Government announced a £27 million award for the "No Witness, No Justice" Project. This project will ensure victims and witnesses needs are taken into account so that they are more likely to attend on the date of trial.
The impact of each is being assessed.
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John Cryer: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what steps he is taking to reduce the number of unnecessary adjournments of court proceedings. [157333]
Mr. Leslie: Adjournments and ineffective hearings in criminal cases are often caused by poor case preparation. The Department for Constitutional Affairs is working with the Home Office and Crown Prosecution Service to reduce the number of ineffective trials and improve case preparation and progression, including through the Effective Trial Management Programme. All criminal courts have been directed to address the rate of ineffective trials.
Criminal Defence Services
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what assessment he has made of the average cost per case of (a) defence counsel and (b) solicitors for the defence funded by the Criminal Defence Services in (i) 2001–02 and (ii) 2002–03. [149442]
Mr. Lammy: It is not possible to provide information in the form requested for the following reasons:
- (a) work under the General Criminal Contract, carried out for hearings in the magistrates courts, is paid for by a different mechanism from hearings in the Crown court. Therefore there is no continuity of data which would readily enable us to identify total payments in cases heard in the magistrates court, and which are subsequently transferred to the Crown court and;
- (b) standard fees in the magistrates courts paid to solicitors may include money subsequently paid by a solicitor to unassigned counsel for publicly funded work. Therefore is not possible to obtain average case costs split between solicitor and counsel.
Emergency Protection Orders
Mr. Andrew Turner: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs how many applications were heard for emergency protection orders in each county in England in the last year for which information is available; what proportion were granted; how many were ex-parte applications; and what proportion of ex-parte applications were granted. [157610]
Mr. Leslie: Figures showing the number of applications for an emergency protection order and the number of orders made, by each county in England for the year 2002, are provided in the following table. No information is held centrally concerning those applications that were made ex-parte and can be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Note:
The orders made do not necessarily relate to the applications made due to the period between application and order. The figures contain imputed data.
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Family History Research
Mr. Dhanda: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what steps his Department can take to enable individuals researching their family history to obtain more official documents, including censuses, online. [156817]
Mr. Leslie: In recent years the National Archives has developed many online services aimed at family historians, including the digitisation of wills from 1384 to 1858. This and other services are available on its website at: www.nationalarchives.gov.uk. It also operates a website which acts as a gateway for online family sources throughout the United Kingdom at www.familyrecords.gov.uk. The National Archives is determined to maintain this momentum through the development of its digitisation programmes and licensing agreements with commercial organisations.
Mr. Dhanda: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs if he will publish online the 1911 census. [157097]
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Mr. Leslie: I refer the hon. Member to the answers I have given to the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland on 10 December 2003, Official Report, column 457W and on 18 December 2003, Official Report, column 1112W.
Judicial Review
Mr. Coleman: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs (1) what the average cost to public funds of a judicial review case was in each of the last three years; [156799]
- (2) what the (a) average and (b) total cost was to public funds of judicial review cases relating to decisions under section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Bill 2002 in 2003. [156801]
Mr. Leslie: The Administrative Court Office does not identify unit costs for judicial review claims.
It is not responsible for funding for "legal aid" for judicial review—that is the responsibility of the Legal Services Commission—and details of costs incurred by public authorities responding to claims are not kept by the Administrative Court Office.
The information requested therefore could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
Mr. Coleman: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what the average length to final determination was of a judicial review case in each of the last three years. [156800]
Mr. Leslie: The average waiting times for civil judicial review (issued after October 2000 when the new judicial review procedure was introduced) for the last three calendar years are as follows:
- 2001—20.9 weeks
- 2002—31.3 weeks
- 2003—31.1 weeks
The average waiting times include the periods in which cases were stood out of the list pending determination of test cases and any subsequent appeals in those matters.
Mr. Coleman: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what the average length of judicial review cases relating to decisions under section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 was in 2003. [156809]
Mr. Leslie: In 2003 the average waiting time for such cases was 19.9 weeks including the time cases were 'stood out' pending decisions in lead cases and any subsequent appeals in those lead cases.
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