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Departmental Working Hours
Mr. Hoban: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many hours (a) in total and (b) on average per employee were worked by civil servants in his Department in the last year for which records are available. [195824]
Maria Eagle: The Department does not collate records of the total or average hours worked by its employees. The information requested could be provided only at a disproportionate cost.
Euthanasia
Chris McCafferty: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what consideration he has given to the Law Commission's recommendations relating to recognition in law of mercy killing as (a) an offence and (b) a partial defence; and what plans he has to consult the public on these matters. [200423]
Maria Eagle: The Law Commission has not made any recommendations for an offence or partial defence of "mercy" killing. It has recommended that the Government undertake a public consultation on the issue.
This is a difficult and sensitive area. As the Law Commission recognises, the question of whether there should be a partial defence of "mercy" killing raises many of the same issues raised by the debate as to whether assisted dying should be legalised. The Government have made clear that assisted dying is a matter of conscience and for Parliament to decide. Parliament has considered this on several recent occasions. The Government have no current plans to take forward a consultation in this area.
Fines: Surcharges
Mr. Malins: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what value of victim surcharge monies has been (a) imposed and (b) collected since the introduction of the victim surcharge in criminal courts in the Greater London area; to which victims' organisations the money collected has been disbursed; how much has been disbursed to each organisation; and if he will make a statement. [201166]
Maria Eagle:
Receipts from the surcharge are appropriated in aid as part of the Ministry of Justice Estimates; allocations are made to recipient organisations or other departments as appropriate. Some recipient organisations based in London provide a national service while others provide a national help-line. Full details of how the surcharge revenue was being used nationally
were given in my answer to the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) of 26 November 2007, Official Report, column 96W.
In the period April 2007 to March 2008 courts in the London region collected £549,048 in victims surcharge receipts. However, under current IT systems it is not possible to extract and collate centrally information on the value of surcharge impositions entered into local court case management and accounting systems.
Recipient organisations with a Greater London area only remit, and the indicative grant, included the following:
| £ | |
A further £200,000 was allocated to the London Domestic Violence Coordinating Group for assignment to independent domestic violence adviser (IDVA) services supporting existing specialist domestic violence court (SDVC) areas and services considering the development of SDVCs. Funding of £20,000 was assigned to each of the following boroughs:
Brent SDVC: Victim Support Brent
Croydon SDVC: Croydon Women's Aid, Family Justice Centre
West London SDVC, Advance, covering Hammersmith and Fulham and
Women's Trust IDVA Service, covering Kensington and Chelsea
Barking and Dagenham: Community Safety and Prevention Services Division
Barnet DV Support Service
Greenwich Women's Trust/DV Advocacy Service
Harrow Hestia Women's Aid
Hillingdon Community Safety
Islington Community Safety
A proportion of the allocations is also passed to the Crown Prosecution Service towards the cost of maintaining victim and witness services through the joint Police/CPS witness care units. It is not possible to say what proportion of this is spent in the Greater London area because this designation does not correspond to the boundaries of CPS operational areas.
Freedom of Information: Private Sector
Norman Baker: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what progress he has made in his assessment of the desirability of extending the remit of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to private companies deemed to be delivering public functions. [201309]
Mr. Straw:
The Government received over 130 responses to its consultation on extending the coverage of the Freedom of Information Act to organisations exercising functions of a public nature. The consultation officially
concluded on 1( )February 2008 but a number of responses received up to a month later were accepted and are being taken into account.
The Government are continuing to analyse the responses and assess the desirability and implications of designating additional public authorities under the Act.
Homicide
Chris McCafferty: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice (1) what his timetable is for the introduction of legislative proposals to amend the law of homicide; [200421]
(2) what his timetable is for launching a consultation on potential changes to the law of homicide. [200422]
Maria Eagle: In December 2006, following extensive public consultation, the Law Commission published its report on "Murder, Manslaughter and Infanticide". That report was intended as the first stage in the review of the law in this area, with the Government to undertake the second stage.
On 12 December 2007 I announced the commencement of that next stage of the review which is looking first at the recommendations relating to provocation, diminished responsibility, complicity and infanticide. Discussions have been taking place with stakeholders over the last few months. If it is decided that legislative change is necessary, draft clauses will be published for consultation in the summer. Any subsequent legislation would be introduced as soon as parliamentary time allows.
Karian and Box
Mr. Hands: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what the value was of each contract awarded by his Department and its predecessors to Karian and Box since 1997. [199648]
Maria Eagle: From April 1999 until March 2007, the financial years for when records are available, my Department has not awarded any contracts to Karian and Box.
Offenders
Nick Herbert: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what three offender characteristics are given the greatest weight when calculating the predicted rate of adult re-offending; and what assessment he has made of the effect of each on the predicted rate. [200202]
Mr. Straw: The calculation of the predicted rate of adult re-offending considers three main offender characteristics: gender, age and criminal history of the offender—although these characteristics are broken down further in the model by various subcategories.
The individual effect of each on the predicted rate was not assessed in detail because the main purpose of the predicted rate is to control for offender characteristics across different cohorts. In short, it is the combined effect of all offender characteristics which is of greatest interest.
Detailed methodology on how the predicted rate is derived can be found in the ‘Methodological annex:
statistical modelling’ section of the 2007 report ‘Re-offending of adults: results from the 2004 cohort’, available online at:
Police Custody: Essex
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many people were held in custody in police cells in Essex in each of the last three years. [190703]
Mr. Straw: Prisoners are held in police cells either under Operation Safeguard or as ad-hoc “lockouts”.
Operation Safeguard was not used in 2005. The number of occasions on which prisoners were held under Operation Safeguard in Essex in 2006 and 2007 is shown in the table below. An occasion is one prisoner night. The average number of prisoners held under Operation Safeguard per night is also shown.
| 2006 | 2007 | |
| (1) Based on number of nights that Safeguard was available in each year, rounded to nearest whole number | ||
In 2006 Operation Safeguard was not used before mid-October.
Data on ad-hoc lockouts is not available for individual police forces but nationally they represent a very small proportion of the total numbers held in police cells.
Prisoners: Rehabilitation
Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice when he plans to fund the implementation of the integrated drug treatment system across all prisons in England and Wales. [199693]
Maria Eagle: On 17 March 2008, Official Report, columns 49-50WS, my hon. Friend, the Minister of State, Ministry of Justice the Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson), my right hon. Friend, the Minister of State, Department of Health the Member for Bristol, South (Dawn Primarolo) and my hon. Friend, the Under-Secretary of State for Health the Member for Bury, South (Mr. Lewis), announced the Government's plans for drug treatment funding. This stated that the Department of Health will make £24.4 million available for clinical aspects of the Integrated Drug Treatment System (IDTS) in 2008-09—a rise of £11.7 million on 2007-08 levels. This will allow a roll-out of enhanced clinical treatment in around 38 more prisons.
Department of Health funding for prison clinical drug treatment will rise to £39 million (indicative) in 2009-10 and £43 million (indicative) in 2010-11 which will enable enhanced clinical services to be available in all prisons.
Decisions on funding for the psycho-social elements of IDTS have yet to be taken.
Prosecutions: Drugs
David Davis:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many people were (a) prosecuted and (b) convicted of a third (i) Class A drug trafficking and (ii)
domestic burglary offence in each of the last seven years, broken down by age group. [198847]
Mr. Straw: The table shows the number of people recorded as sentenced to the mandatory minimum sentence for a third class A drug trafficking offence and third domestic burglary; under sections 110 and 111 of the Power of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act (2000).
These are the numbers recorded by courts as receiving the mandatory sentence. As the Courts Proceedings Database does not include criminal histories we are not able to identify those who were not given the mandatory minimum from this data source.
| Persons sentenced( 1 ) to immediate custody under the Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000. 2000-06—England and Wales | ||
| Number of persons | ||
| Section 110 | Section 111 | |
| Minimum 7 years for third class A drug trafficking offence | Minimum 3 years for third domestic burglary | |
| (1) Principal offence basis These figures have been drawn from administrative data 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. Source: RDS-NOMS, Ministry of Justice | ||
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