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10 July 2006 : Column 1674W—continued
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to his Answer of 16 May 2006, Official Report, column 903W, on police, if he will collect data centrally on the numbers of (a) police officers and (b) other employees who have taken early retirement in each police force in England and Wales in each year since 1997; and if he will make a statement. [73786]
Mr. McNulty: We do not currently collect data centrally on the number of early retirements amongst police staff and there are no comparable figures to collect in respect of police officers. In view of the operational requirements of policing officers may retire under the police pension scheme of 1987, which applies to those who joined the service before 6 April 2006, with an immediate ordinary pension after 30 years’ service or from age 50 if they have at least 25 years’ service. The only means by which officers can retire earlier than that with a pension is on the grounds of ill-health. The rate of ill-health retirements among police officers has fallen from 14 per 1,000 officers in service in 1997-98 to three per 1,000 in 2004-05. We will consider the case for widening the scope of the data we collect from forces in the way suggested by the hon. Member.
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what estimate he has made of the net change in the number of police force posts following the creation of a single strategic force for Wales. [82368]
Mr. McNulty [holding answer 4 July 2006]: The business case for amalgamation of the four Welsh police forces, which was sent to the forces and police authorities concerned on 3 March, assumed no change in the total number of police officers in Wales .
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what percentage of police officers in each police authority area come from ethnic minority backgrounds. [83681]
Mr. McNulty: The information requested is available in the “Police Service Strength publication as at 31 March 2005”. This report was published on 25 July 2005 and is available in the Library of the House and on:http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs06/hosb0106.pdf.
Mr. Kidney: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many former police officers are in receipt of injury pensions. [84116]
Mr. McNulty: The information requested is not held centrally.
Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many police community support officers (a) were recruited and (b) left the service in Yeovil constituency in (i) 2004-05 and (ii) 2005-06. [82136]
Mr. McNulty: Police personnel data are collected on a financial year basis by police force area. The latest information available is for 2004-05.
In 2004-05 Avon and Somerset police force recruited 139 full-time equivalent (FTE) police community support officers (PCSOs), and no PCSOs were recorded as leaving the force during this period.
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many complaints about police conduct and behaviour have been (a) submitted and (b) upheld in each police force in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [82986]
Mr. McNulty: The data requested is not held centrally.
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many police pursuits of motorbike thieves have resulted in injury to the operator of the motorbike in the last 12 months for which figures are available. [82818]
Mr. McNulty: The data requested is not held centrally.
Mr. Martyn Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the mechanism will be for the equalisation of council tax precepts across Wales following the proposed merger of the four Welsh police forces. [67830]
Mr. McNulty: The new strategic police authority will be the precepting authority for the strategic police force. No final decisions have yet been taken on transitional arrangements to allow for convergence of precepts over several years.
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many police officers in each police force have been (a) disciplined and (b) dismissed for racism in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [82929]
Mr. McNulty: The requested information is not collected centrally.
Mr. Spring: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) resignations and (b) retirements of police officers from the Suffolk constabulary there have been in each year since 1997. [82111]
Mr. McNulty: The available information is provided in the following table:
| Full-time equivalent( 1) police officer resignations and retirements in Suffolk, 1997-2005 | ||
| As at 31 March each year | Voluntary resignations( 2) | Retirements( 3) |
| (1) Prior to 2003, FTE figures excluded those on career breaks or maternity/paternity leave. (2) Voluntary resignations does not include those who are dismissed and required to resign. (3) Retirements includes normal retirements and medical retirements. | ||
Pornography
Mrs. James: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what progress is being made on preventing children from gaining access to hardcore pornography. [56007]
Mr. Coaker: Strong controls already exist to protect children from hardcore pornography in the UK. I refer my hon. Friend to the answers that my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale, East (Paul Goggins), then Under-Secretary of State at the Home Department, gave on 23 March 2006, Official Report, column 607W, and 28 March 2006, Official Report, column 909W, and the answer given by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on 27 March 2006, Official Report, column 651W. In addition, DCMS Ministers have agreed a code of practice with the British Hospitality Association to prevent children under the age of 18 from exposure to video works classified at 18/R18 provided through pay to view systems in hotels.
Port Security
Mrs. James: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department which UK ports have 24-hour security; and what plans the Government have to introduce 24-hour security at further ports. [82029]
Mr. Byrne: There are currently 19 ports in the UK and in juxtaposed locations which are staffed 24 hours a day. A further 16 have staff based there during operating hours. Other ports are covered on a regular basis to cover scheduled services with all remaining points of entry attended on a risk assessed basis or in response to specific intelligence.
Post Office Services
Danny Alexander: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department for which services (a) his Department and (b) its associated public bodies hold contracts with the Post Office; and what the (i) start and (ii) termination date is of each contract. [81539]
Mr. Byrne: Two services are made available by Post Office Ltd. on behalf of the Department. The cash payment facility for asylum seekers is provided by National Asylum Support Services (NASS) through the Sodexho Pass contract which subcontracts to the Post Office the distribution of cash to asylum seekers. The contract commenced on 7 January 2000, and has been extended in accordance with the contract, it expires on 31 December 2006. A new cash payment contract however is due to be let in July 2006 with a view to going live no later than 31 December 2006. Post Office Ltd. provides a passport application Check and Send service and holds passport applications packs at post office branches on behalf of the Identity and Passport Service (IPS). This service has operated since 1996. The current agreement for the Check & Send service runs until 30 September 2007. Before the expiry of the current agreement IPS expect to run a procurement exercise for a continuation of this provision.
Mr. Andrew Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what services (a) his Department and (b) its associated public bodies (i) make available and (ii) have made available in the last five years through the Post Office network; through how many outlets the service is or was made available; and how many relevant transactions were undertaken in each case in the most recent year for which figures are available. [79198]
Mr. Byrne: Two services are made available by Post Office Ltd. on behalf of the Department. The cash payment facility for asylum seekers is provided by National Asylum Support Services (NASS) through the Sodexho Pass contract which subcontracts to the Post Office, the distribution of cash to asylum seekers, using a total of 530 outlets throughout the UK (although only about 420 outlets are currently used). The contract commenced on 7 January 2000 and has been extended in accordance with the contract. It expires on 31 December 2006. A new cash payment contract however is due to be let in July 2006 with a view to going live no later than 31 December 2006. Post Office Ltd. provides a passport application Check and Send service and hold passport applications packs at 2,513 branches on behalf of the Identity and Passport Service. This service has operated since 1996 and from June 2005 to May 2006 POL processed 2,721,334 passport applications through this service.
Prisoner Information Points
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the (a) deployment, (b) availability and (c) use of prisoner information points; which prison establishments have such facilities; what plans he has to extend availability in each prison; how much has been spent in each prison establishment on prisoner information points; and what mechanisms are in place to ensure public protection through these facilities. [73747]
Mr. Sutcliffe: In 2004, British Telecommunications plc was awarded a contract to construct and install prisoner information points. HM Prison Service has assisted BT in developing the product, but has no obligation to purchase any terminals. It is therefore left to individual establishments to decide whether they wish to purchase the PIPs. The eastern region of the Legal Services Commission has purchased 14 terminals to serve prisons in the east midlands area, as part of their resettlement agenda. In exchange, HMPS has provided facilities for LSC to present local information on the PIPs in these prisons, which are based on the seven resettlement pathways. Currently there are orders for a total of 22 PIPs based in 17 establishments. The information on the terminals is based on the 21 Prison Service Standards which directly affect prisoners’ day- to-day life. The terminals are a stand-alone system and do not permit prisoner access to the internet.
Prisoners
Mr. Clegg:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) of 7 November 2005, Official Report, column 57W, on prisoners, how
many crimes were committed by people released from prison before the end of their sentence in 2005-06. [76915]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Information on the number of prisoners released on parole licence who were recalled to prison in 2005-06 because of being charged with a further offence will be published in the Parole Board annual report for 2005-06 available towards the end of 2006. In the year 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006, around 16,600 prisoners were released on home detention curfew, according to the prison IT system. By the end of May 2006 the Home Office had been notified of 965 offences, reported as committed during the period 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006, for which a prisoner on HDC had been cautioned, convicted or was awaiting prosecution (which may not result in a conviction). This figure will change in future as further reports are received of acquittals, charges dropped, further offences identified, or convictions.
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the breakdown of the prison population was in terms of (a) ethnic background, (b) religion, (c) age and (d) sex in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [82935]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Information on the breakdowns requested of the prison population is to be found in tables 8.4, 8.4a, 8.5, and 8.6 in the Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2004, a copy of which can be found in the House of Commons Library. The internet tables for Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2004 are available at the following internet address:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/omcs.html.
Prisons
Stewart Hosie: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what spending on the prison service is (a) identifiable and (b) non-identifiable for the purposes of the public expenditure statistical analysis. [48788]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The departmental expenditure limit for HM Prison Service during 2004-05 was £2,446,412,000 of which: £167,791,000 is regarded as identifiable expenditure and £2,278,621,000 is regarded as non-identifiable expenditure.
Mr. Iain Wright: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many and what proportion of the total prison population released in each year since 1990 completed (a) 100 per cent., (b) 90 to 99 per cent., (c) 80 to 89 per cent., (d) 70 to 79 per cent., (e) 60 to 69 per cent., (f) 50 to 59 per cent. and (g) less than 50 per cent. of their total prison sentence. [77189]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Information on average time served for prisoners discharged under sentence is published in tables 10.1 and 10.2 of Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2004, a copy of which is available in the House of Commons Library. Comprehensive information on time served for the different bands specified could be produced only at disproportionate cost.
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many inmates have had added days awarded to them by the independent adjudicator and subsequently also had days restored to them by prison governors in each prison in each of the last 12 months; how many days were (i) awarded by the independent adjudicator and (ii) restored by the governor in each case; what the reasons were for the restoration in each case; and if he will make a statement. [78104]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The numbers of added days imposed or remitted in each prison will vary according to the size of the establishment and the nature of the population. Detailed information is not collated centrally. The reasons for restoration of added days in individual cases are not recorded centrally, but in each case the governor (or controller in contracted prisons) considers applications for remission according to criteria set out in Prison Service guidance.
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many independent adjudications were carried out in each prison establishment in each of the last 15 months. [78128]
Mr. Sutcliffe: A monthly breakdown of independent adjudications is not available but according to returns from prisons. Independent adjudicators only attend to hear the more serious disciplinary charges for which added days are a likely punishment.
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the cost of independent adjudications was in each prison establishment for each of the last 12 months. [78129]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The cost of each visit by an independent adjudicator (district judge) to an establishment is estimated at £700, including an estimated average for expenses of £100 per visit.
A monthly breakdown of independent adjudicators' visits to each prison is not available.
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many civilian staff are employed at HM Prison Wandsworth. [78167]
Mr. Sutcliffe: As at 15 June 2006, Wandsworth prison employed 191 civilian staff out of a total of 735 staff.
Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many Irish nationals are being held in each prison establishment. [78187]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Information on the numbers of Irish national prisoners held in prison establishments within England and Wales, as recorded on the prison IT system, is contained within the following table;
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