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7 Jun 2006 : Column 750W—continued
| Total number of absconds from Springhill prison, who has not yet been apprehended, by calendar year and type of offence | |||||
| Offence | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 |
Nick Herbert: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prisoners have absconded from Ford prison since 21 May; how many were (a) awaiting deportation and (b) being considered for deportation; and if he will make a statement. [75225]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Six prisoners, all foreign nationals, have absconded from Ford open prison since 21 May 2006. Of these two were being considered for deportation and four had been notified to IND but no decision had been reached on enforcement proceedings.
Nick Herbert: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many foreign national prisoners are being held in Ford prison; and how many of them are (a) awaiting deportation and (b) being considered for deportation. [75227]
Mr. Sutcliffe: None. All foreign national prisoners were removed from Ford prison on 26 May 2006 and returned to closed conditions where they will be subject to full and rigorous risk assessment before any decision is made on the level of security they require.
Nick Herbert: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he plans to review the risk assessment procedures for prisoners who are awaiting deportation, or being considered for deportation, before they are accepted to open prisons. [75228]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Following a review of the criteria for the categorisation of foreign national prisoners and their allocation to open conditions in May, the Prison Service concluded that no changes were required of the policy. However, governors have been instructed to take into account recent public statements made by Ministers, including the Prime Minister, regarding the likelihood of deportation when considering foreign national prisoners for category D status and allocation to open conditions. The overriding purpose of the security classification must be to ensure that prisoners are retained in custody with a level of security that is consistent with the need to protect the public.
Probation Service
David T.C. Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many offenders were placed under supervision of the probation service by the courts in 2005-06. [75392]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The latest available information shows that some 137,624 offenders started court order supervision by the probation service in the year from 1 October 2004 to 30 September 2005.
Promotion Boards
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what promotion boards have been held in his Department in each of the last five years. [72877]
Mr. Byrne: Annual promotion boards have not been held in the Home Office since 2000.
Prosecutions (Northern Ireland)
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what percentage of cases brought for prosecution by the Public Prosecution Service in Northern Ireland resulted in conviction in each of the last 10 years. [74424]
The Solicitor-General: I have been asked to reply.
The Public Prosecution Service, which when fully rolled out will be responsible for all prosecutions arising from police investigations, only came into existence in June 2005. Prior to that date, the Department of the Director of Public Prosecutions was only responsible for the conduct of the more serious criminal cases and the bulk of prosecutions in the magistrates court were
conducted by the police. The police continue to conduct prosecutions in the magistrates court in those areas not yet covered by the PPS. The figures provided in the tables reflect, therefore, only those cases conducted by the PPS or the old Department of the DPP.
Figures are only available for the past five years following the introduction of a Case Management System.
The figures for the magistrates court are:
| 2001-02 | 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | |
The figures for the Crown court are:
| 2001-02 | 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | |
Road Traffic Act
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what recent discussions he has had with the Parliamentary Advisory Committee on Transportation Safety on (a) the enforcement of and (b) other issues connected with sections (i) 14 and (ii) 15 of the Road Traffic Act 1988; and if he will make a statement. [75631]
Mr. Coaker: My officials are in regular contact with the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety and discuss a range of roads policing issues. The wearing of seat belts has not however featured specifically in recent discussions. The enforcement of requirements as to the wearing of seat belts is an operational matter for the police.
Serious Organised Crime Agency
Mr. Greenway: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what targets he plans to set the Serious Organised Crime Agency for tackling fraud. [72087]
Mr. Coaker: The Home Secretary’s letter setting priorities for the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) in its first year of operation has been laid before Parliament. The priorities set out there include tackling organised crime threats from fraud against individuals and the private sector. The SOCA Board has subsequently determined that approximately 10 per cent. of its overall effort should be devoted to fraud.
The Home Secretary has set a broad performance framework for SOCA within which its performance will be judged on its ability to contribute to the reduction of the harm caused to the UK by serious crime. The measures on which SOCA will be judged will include the quality of its knowledge and understanding of the crime networks and markets in its priority areas, and the dislocation that it is achieving in respect of those networks and markets.
Student Visas
Mr. Carswell: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many foreign students from (a) Nigeria, (b) Pakistan, (c) Ghana and (d) Bangladesh remain in the UK having outstayed their student visa. [72381]
Mr. Byrne: This information is not available.
Terror Suspects
Mr. Heald: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment his Department has made of whether foreign national terror suspects are on the electoral roll fraudulently. [74086]
Mr. Byrne: I am advised that we have no specific intelligence that foreign terror suspects are fraudulently registering as electors.
If the hon. Member has particular information relating to this practice he should pass it to the appropriate authorities.
Terrorist Attacks (Compensation)
Mr. Ellwood: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how much compensation has been allocated to people affected by terrorist attacks in the UK in the last 24 months. [74616]
Mr. McNulty: Compensation for people injured in terrorist attacks in Great Britain is paid from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme. There is a separate, broadly similar scheme in Northern Ireland for people injured there.
The compensation provision available to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority for incidents occurring in Great Britain was augmented by £5 million in 2005-06 to cover the extra costs of compensation arising from the 7/7 bombings. A further £2.5 million is being provided in the current financial year for the victims of the 7/7 bombings outside the terms of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme.
Payments made to victims of terrorist incidents occurring in the last 24 months total £2.12 million to date. These payments are all in respect of the London bombings.
Other payments made in the last 24 months in respect of all previous terrorist incidents total £1.06 million. These payments relate to the London (Soho) bombing of 1999 and the Manchester bombing of 1996, and include both final awards and interim awards.
The Government also contributed £1 million to the London Bombings Relief Charitable Fund, which has made payments totalling around £8 million to victims of the London bombings.
Trafficking Convention
Anne Snelgrove: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what progress is being made towards the Government being in a position to sign the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings. [73140]
Mr. Coaker: We have been looking into the various provisions contained in the Council of Europe Convention on trafficking and have been gathering evidence from our European partners about best practice in member states, the impact of provision of support for the victims of trafficking and any impact that provisions including recovery and reflection periods have had.
We are also engaging actively with the key non-governmental organisations and others working in the field of human trafficking to ensure that we explore thoroughly with them the potential benefits and disadvantages of the approach set out in the Convention.
We launched a public consultation on our strategy to combat trafficking in human beings 5 January 2006 this has now closed. We anticipate developing an action plan which takes a comprehensive end-to-end approach covering the different elements of our anti-trafficking strategy. The consultation document asked for views on whether the UK should sign up to the Convention these will be considered in our decision. A summary of responses from the consultation will be published on 21 June.
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