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Written Ministerial Statements

Monday 19 July 2004

DEFENCE

Future Aircraft Carrier

The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): I am pleased to announce that we have decided to extend the future aircraft carrier (CVF) programme assessment phase. This extension will enable us to carry out further risk reduction work and increase the maturity of the design prior to making our main investment decision on demonstration and manufacture (D&M). In line with smart acquisition principles, by spending the right amount of time and money in the assessment phase we will gain a better understanding of the technical and supply-side risks before we make any major commitments. We had planned to complete this risk reduction work within the original demonstration phase. The underlying programme has not been adjusted, but rather the point at which we make the main investment decision has shifted.

We anticipate moving into the D&M phase during 2005, following the main gate decision. At this point we intend to finalise performance, time and cost parameters of the carriers. These will continue to be refined during the remainder of the assessment phase. Our target in service dates (ISO) for the CVF remain 2012 and 2015. When built the two vessels will be the largest and most powerful warships ever constructed in the United Kingdom.

We have also agreed the alliancing principles with industry for the CVF programme which confirms the commitment of all parties to the programme and to an alliance based on commercial best practice. The alliancing principles will provide the most effective way of managing risk and reward and will bring together all parties with a vested financial interest, thus ensuring that we deliver CVF collaboratively. We will now discuss and agree the detailed alliancing arrangements with industry, including the roles and responsibilities of alliance members.

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

UK Civil Plutonium and Uranium

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Nigel Griffiths): The Department will be placing the figures for the United Kingdom's stocks of civil plutonium and uranium as at 31 December 2003 in the Library of the House. In accordance with our commitment under the "Guidelines for the Management of Plutonium", we will also be sending the figures to the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), who will circulate them to Member States in due course. The figures will be available on the Department's and the IAEA's websites.
 
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The figures show that stocks of unirradiated plutonium in the UK totalled 96.3 tonnes at the end of 2003. Changes from the corresponding figures for 2002 are a consequence of continuing reprocessing operations (e.g. as reflected in the increased quantity of "unirradiated separated plutonium in product stores at reprocessing plants"). Other smaller changes are the result of material being allocated to UK fuel. The decrease in unirradiated separated plutonium held elsewhere is due to both Thorp and magnox reprocessing plants being close to empty during December 2003 whereas they were operating over that period in the proceeding year. The decrease in the civil depleted, natural and low enriched uranium figures reflects the change in requirements for these materials at the fuel fabrication plants and reactors.

CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT

Creative Industries Forum on Intellectual Property

The Minister for the Arts (Estelle Morris): I am pleased to inform the House that the Government are setting up a creative industries forum on intellectual property. This will be a cross-governmental body, with ministerial representation, and jointly chaired by me and my noble Friend the Minister for Science and Innovation (Lord Sainsbury), who is making a similar statement to the House of Lords. I am pleased to say that there will also be strong representation from the private sector, both from the creative industries themselves and from other key industry stakeholders such as Internet service providers and hardware manufacturers. Consumers will also be represented.

The forum will create a dialogue on intellectual property issues, such as business models, education and awareness raising, strategies for maximising the opportunities for the creative industries in a digital environment, while also addressing the challenges such as file sharing and piracy.

The launch and first meeting of the forum is taking place on 19 July at the London College of Communication, Elephant and Castle. Industry has warmly welcomed the initiative.

It is anticipated that the forum will work through meetings that will set tasks and objectives to be taken forward. There is intended to be a focus on outputs and deliverables, and I am confident that this will represent a significant development in an area crucial to the UK's future competitiveness.

Terms of reference and membership of the forum will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses shortly.

SOLICITOR GENERAL

Serious Fraud Office

The Solicitor-General (Ms Harriet Harman): The annual report of the Serious Fraud Office has today been published and laid before Parliament. Copies have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
 
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HOME DEPARTMENT

Strategic Plan for Criminal Justice

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. David Blunkett): Today the Government will publish Command Paper 6288, entitled "Cutting Crime—Delivering Justice: Strategic Plan for Criminal Justice 2004–08". Copies of the paper have been placed in the Libraries of the House.

The strategic plan for criminal justice sets out the Government's vision for the criminal justice system (CJS) and how we aim to achieve it, combining forces across the Home Office, the Department for Constitutional Affairs and the Law Officers' Departments.

The plan focuses on how we will provide a better service to victims and witnesses of crime, increase the number of offences brought to justice, tackle offenders who fail to comply with court dates, fines and sentences and improve the way criminal justice agencies work together. This is closely linked to our overall approach to preventing crime and reducing reoffending, which is set out in a parallel document, the Home Office strategic plan. I will announce the details of that plan to the House in an oral statement later today.

The Government are committed to ongoing reform of the criminal justice system. The CJS strategic plan explains how much has already been achieved. Huge steps have been made to establish joint working across the CJS—largely through the success of the 42 Local Criminal Justice Boards across England and Wales and the strong leadership of the National Criminal Justice Board. We know these changes are working because we are seeing improvements on the ground. Overall, crime is down by 25 per cent. since 1997. 7 per cent. more offences have been brought to justice in the last two years. The number of crown court trials that fail to go ahead on the day scheduled has fallen by 25 per cent. The number of assets recovered in the last three years has doubled. Public confidence in criminal justice was falling sharply: we have turned this around.

We have achieved a great deal, but there are still some real issues to tackle. The CJS Strategic plan outlines our key objectives for reform, structured around a vision of the delivery of criminal justice in 2008. To achieve this vision, we need to improve the way agencies work together to support and protect victims and witnesses; we need to further increase the number of offenders brought to justice; we need to tackle offenders who fail to comply with court dates, fines and sentences; and we need to continue progress towards fully joined-up working, including providing the CJS with the information technology it needs to work effectively.

The goal of these reforms is to deliver a service that responds better to the needs of the communities it is there to serve.

Improved service for victims and witnesses is at the heart of this. By the end of next year, in all cases where someone is charged with an offence, the victims and witnesses will be offered support by a witness care unit, to make it more likely that they attend court and give evidence. Over the period, Crown court buildings will have separate waiting facilities for prosecution and defence victims and witnesses. The victims fund, which
 
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will pay for better support services for victims, will also be boosted by a surcharge on all criminals who are convicted.

The public also need to know that the offenders will be brought to book and respect for the law will be maintained. The CIS strategic plan sets out how the prosecution will take responsibility for charging, co-operating earlier with the police to identify the correct charge for the offence. It also describes innovative measures to crack down on those who fail to turn up at court or comply with fines and community penalties. Those who breach bail can now expect action to be taken straightaway, and to be punished for this whatever the decision on the original case. We are working hard to make sure that every offender who defaults on their fine is pursued and made to pay it. With our measures on asset recovery it will be the criminal who pays not the community. Our approach includes: increased powers for frontline enforcement staff including search and entry, and new measures and sanctions from the Courts Act 2003 to help recoup fines, including attachment of earnings and deduction of state benefits, and car clamping. And by rolling out direct access to the police national computer (PNC) for all magistrates courts by autumn 2004, we will enable police officers to identify whether an offender is on the run from court or defaulting on a fine or community sentence.

We will also pilot the community justice centre concept in North Liverpool, bringing new approaches to tackle the low level crime and antisocial behaviour which can make communal life miserable; and to reach offenders and their problems before they progress to serious crime. Court sentences will combine punishment with support to help offenders kick their crime habit. The community will be involved in helping to steer people away from crime.

To achieve all these goals we need to work in close partnership across the justice system. The development of the National Criminal Justice Board and Local Criminal Justice Boards has made great strides in delivering a more seamless service and better outcomes. To build on this, we are announcing today that, in future, joint working across the CJS will be further strengthened by the establishment of the Office for Criminal Justice Reform on a cross departmental basis. This implements the recommendations of a recent review of CJS capacity published in a parallel document "Criminal Justice Reform: Working Together". This means that the teams driving progress on shared CJS targets will in future report on an equal basis to the Home Office, Department for Constitutional Affairs and Law Officers' Departments. Establishing the Office for Criminal Justice Reform as a shared resource serving all three Departments builds on the firm foundations of what we have achieved, and is a powerful symbol of our resolve to work together effectively to deliver better services for the public.

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