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23 Jan 2007 : Column 1702Wcontinued
Mr. Bone: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the Governments policy is on access to police stations by members of the public. [114879]
Mr. McNulty: The use and deployment of resources, including police officers and police stations, are ultimately the responsibility of the local chief constable who is responsible for the day-to-day operational management of the force.
The citizen focus programme of work encourages all forces to look at the most effective ways of engaging with their local communities and responding to their needs by making contact easier and more accessible.
The Citizen Focus Good Practice Guide, which was produced by the Home Office, encourages forces to invest time and resources into improving the service provided at the police station front-counter and through other public contact points, such as call centres and websites.
As part of the Police Performance Assessment Framework (PPAF), User Satisfaction surveys measure the percentage of users satisfied with the ease of contacting the police, highlighting to forces that they need to ensure that the public can access their services in different ways.
The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 imposes a duty on all public services, including police authorities and forces, to ensure their services are accessible to
disabled persons, both in terms of physical premises and also general service provisions.
Mr. Steen: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department from which countries the 70 children refused by the Poppy Project in the last 12 months come; how old each child was; in which local authority areas they are residing; and how many have been deported. [112670]
Mr. Coaker [holding answer 19 December 2006]: The Poppy project accepts only adult female victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation. The Project informs me it received 46 referrals of victims between the ages of 15 and 17 since it opened in March 2003 until December 2006. I understand the project has not retained any additional information on these referrals. It is therefore not possible to provide any information on the immigration status of these young women.
It would be the duty of any local authority receiving a referral to assess that childs need for accommodation and support under section 20 of the Children Act 1989.
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many drug-misusing prisoners were assessed as having rehabilitation needs in each of the last 10 years. [115497]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The information is not recorded in the way requested. Instead prisons rely on epidemiological data which show that, on average, approximately 55 per cent. of prisoners report a serious drug problem prior to prison, with 80 per cent. reporting some prior misuse. A research study showed that only 15 per cent. of users were categorised as having no immediate treatment need.
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many drug-misusing prisoners were provided with rehabilitation in each of the last 10 years. [115498]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The following table shows the numbers of prisoners with a drug problem who engage subsequently with prison drug treatment services in the years for which the information is available.
Intensive programme entrants | |||
Clinical Services includes maintenance, detoxification and alcohol detoxification | CARATs counselling assessment, referral, advice and throughcare service initial assessments | Intensive programme entrants | |
(1) Includes 8,709 by YPSMS Young Peoples Substance Misuse Service for under-18s Notes: 1. Individual prisoners may engage in more than one form of treatment. 2. Includes maintenance, detoxification and alcohol detoxification. 3. Counselling, assessment, referral, advice and throughcare service. 4. Young peoples substance misuse service for under-18s. |
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will take steps to ensure that there is no financial disincentive to prisoners for taking educational courses in prison; and if he will make a statement. [115500]
Mr. Sutcliffe: Education is delivered in prisons in a variety of ways. Governors can and do establish systems of bonus payments to recognise and reward achievements in education when obtaining nationally recognised qualifications or reaching challenging sentence plan targets.
The policy on prisoners' wages is contained in Prison Service Order 4460 which sets out national minimum levels of pay and requires prison governors to establish local pay schemes that provide an incentive for prisoners to achieve sentence plan targets, which may include attending education and offending behaviour courses.
Mr. Burrowes: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what steps he takes to ensure that prisoners do not receive benefits while in custody. [115516]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The Prison Service provide Department of Work and Pensions with weekly details of new prisoners so that they can review benefits claimed by the prisoner and stop them where appropriate.
Jobcentre Plus advisers also help in closing down benefit claims such as income support and jobseekers allowance.
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) male and (b) female prisoners were convicted for drugs offences in each of the last 10 years. [113648]
Mr. Sutcliffe:
Information on the numbers of (a) male and (b) female prisoners received into prison establishments in England and Wales in each year since 1995 on immediate custodial sentences for drugs offences can be found within the following table taken from table 7.2 of the recently published Offender
Management Caseload Statistics 2005 which can be accessed at the following website:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs06/hosb1806.pdf
These figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems.
Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system, and although shown to the last individual the figures may not be accurate to that level.
Receptions into prison establishments in England and Wales on immediate custodial sentence for drugs offences, 1995-2005(based on table 7.2 in Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2005) | |||
Male | Female | Total | |
Mrs. Gillan: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) men and (b) women from Wales are detained in prisons in England. [115087]
Mr. Sutcliffe: On 30 September 2006, the latest date information is available, 1,411 male prisoners and 183 women prisoners from Wales were held in prisons in England.
Mrs. Gillan: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) men and (b) women were being held in prisons in Wales on 12 December 2006. [115089]
Mr. Sutcliffe: There were (a) 2,654 men and (b) no women held in prisons in Wales on 30 November 2006, the latest date for which figures are available. This information is available in Table 4 of the Population in Custody Monthly Tables November 2006 England and Wales on the website at:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/prisnov06.pdf
These figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system, and although shown to the last individual the figures may not be accurate to that level.
Mr. Vara: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to the answer of 5 December 2006, Official Report, columns 292-3W, on prisons, how many inmates who (a) self-harmed and (b) committed suicide (i) had previously been identified as suffering from mental illness and (ii) were subsequently identified as suffering from mental illness in each year since 1997. [117183]
Mr. Sutcliffe [holding answer 22 January 2007]: Information about mental illness among prisoners is not collated centrally in the requested format and could be obtained only at a disproportionate cost.
John McDonnell: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the projected balance of spending is in the London Probation Area budget for 2006-07; and what consequences are expected for service delivery. [113400]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The London Probation Boards budget for 2006-07 is £137.5 million. The board is currently forecasting an overspending of £3.5 million (2.5 per cent.) against this budget. The overspending is not causing any detrimental impact on service delivery.
Mr. Nicholas Brown: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what performance indicators his Department uses to measure the performance of the probation service; and what assessment he has made of recent trends in the probation services performance. [114956]
Mr. Sutcliffe: The national probation service has been set performance targets that cover the key objectives of protecting the public and reducing re-offending while reflecting the priority given to work with offenders on matters such as accommodation; education, training and employment; health and drugs and alcohol, as well as addressing the needs of victims.
Details of the performance of the 42 probation areas in England and Wales against the performance targets and measures set for the service are published on a quarterly basis in national probation service performance reports. The reports are public documents and are posted on the NPS website at:
http://www.probation.homeoffice.gov.uk/output/page34.asp.
The latest report (22) shows that the national probation service had met or exceeded nine of the 13 performance targets for the first six months of 2006-07. (Data on the regionally set employment targets for minority ethnic staff will not be available until the new year when the census returns are made. This target has been met in each of the previous years since monitoring began and it is envisaged that it will be met again this year.)
Mr. Laurence Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what the average time spent in prison was for those convicted of burglary in each of the last 10 years; [108848]
(2) what the average time spent in prison was by those convicted of violence against the person in each of the last 10 years. [108851]
Mr. Sutcliffe:
Information on the length of sentences for prisoners received into prison establishments in England and Wales during 2005 for offences of violence against the person and burglary are in the following table. This table is published as table 7.3 within the Offender Management Caseload Statistics
2005, a copy of which can be found in the House of Commons Library. Information on the average time served, by sentence length, is shown in table 10.1 of the same publication.
Equivalent tables for 2004 (table 7.3, 10.1) can be found at:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs05/hosb1705section7.xls
and for 2003 (table 7.3, 10.1) at:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs04/hosb1504section7.xls
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