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22 Jan 2009 : Column 1608W—continued

Repossession Orders: Chelmsford

Mr. Burns: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many court orders have been issued for the repossession of homes in West Chelmsford constituency in each of the last five years. [249978]

Bridget Prentice: Although figures for the West Chelmsford constituency are not available, the following tables show the number of mortgage and landlord possession orders made in Chelmsford county court from 2003 onwards.

The civil procedure rules state that all claims for the repossession of land must be commenced in the district in which the land is situated. However, Chelmsford county court covers areas other than West Chelmsford and therefore not all possession actions at this court will relate to this constituency.

Court level statistics on mortgage and landlord repossession actions from 1987 to 2007 are available on the Ministry of Justice website at:

http://www.justice.gov.uk/publications/mortgatelandlordpossession.htm

These figures do not indicate how many homes have actually been repossessed. Repossessions can occur without a court order being made, while not all court orders result in repossession.

Table 1: Mortgage( 1 ) possession orders made( 4,5) in the Chelmsford county court, 2003-08( *)
	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008 (January-September)
Chelmsford	175	226	355	381	383	381
HMCS South East Region	8,201	10,050	15,220	17,693	17,870	16,169

Table 2: Landlord( 2) possession orders made( 3,4,5 ) in the Chelmsford county court, 2003-08*
	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008 (January-September)
Chelmsford	347	337	266	313	332	274
HMCS South East Region	20,336	19,834	19,157	18,093	19,177	16,044
(1) Mortgage possession data include all types of lenders whether local authority or private. (2) Landlord possession data include all types of landlord whether social or private. (3) Includes orders made through both standard and accelerated procedures. Landlord actions via the accelerated procedure enables the orders to be made solely on the basis of written evidence and shorthold tenancies, when the fixed period of tenancy has come to an end. (4) Includes outright and suspended orders, the later being where the court grants the claimant possession but suspends the operation of the order. Provided the defendant complies with the terms of suspension, which usually require the defendant to pay the current mortgage or rent instalments plus some of the accrued arrears, the possession order cannot be enforced. (5) The court, following a judicial hearing, may grant an order for possession immediately. This entitles the claimant to apply for a warrant to have the defendant evicted. However, even where a warrant for possession is issued, the parties can still negotiate a compromise to prevent eviction. * Figures for 2008 are provisional Source: Ministry of Justice

Royal Family: Wills

Norman Baker: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice (1) if he will publish sealed Royal Wills in cases where such Wills were sealed prior to 1990. [249315]

(2) if he will review his policy on the practice of allowing Royal wills to be sealed. [249316]

Mr. Straw: The power to seal and unseal all Wills is exercised by the court. The decision whether or not to permit inspection of a Will of a senior member of the Royal Family that has been sealed by the court is a matter for the President of the Family Division upon application.

The President is currently considering setting up a committee to review the Non-Contentious Probate Rules 1987, which will include consideration of the current
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rules relating to the inspection and/or publication of Wills. The power to make new rules is vested in the President with the concurrence of the Lord Chancellor.

Sentencing

Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many prisoners were released on home detention curfew in each year since 1999 have served (a) one quarter of their sentence, (b) 90 days less than half their sentence and (c) 30 days of their sentence; for what offences were prisoners in each of those three bands originally convicted; and what the average length of the original sentence handed down to the offender in each of those three bands was. [250392]

Mr. Hanson: The information requested on length on time served prior to release on Home Detention Curfew (HDC) could be provided by examining individual prisoner
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records only at disproportionate cost. However information is available on the number of prisoners released on HDC in each year from 1999-2007 by sentence length band, as shown in the following tables. These figures can be found in Prison Statistics England and Wales, 1999-2002 and Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2003-07, copies of which can be found in the House of Commons Library, and also on the Ministry of Justice website at:

http://www.justice.gov.uk/publications/prisonandprobation.htm.

Eligible prisoners are not released on HDC unless they have served a minimum of one quarter of their sentence in custody, subject to a minimum of 30 days.

These figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems, which, as with any large scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing.

Home Detention Curfew release by sentence length—t aken from table 10.16 in OMCS 2007, 9. 13 in OMCS 2006 and earlier tables in OMCS and PSEW—England and Wales
	1999			2000			2001
	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)
Total	49,530	14,820	30	55,344	15,513	28	54,064	13,664	25
All cases to less than 12 months	27,558	7,440	34	31,382	7,927	25	30,646	6,747	22
3 months to less than 4 months	6,256	1,370	27	7,177	1,553	22	6,791	1,205	18
4 months to less than 6 months	9,612	2,354	22	11,116	2,338	21	11,239	2,067	18
6 months to less than 8 months	7,023	2,061	24	8,047	2,304	29	8,110	1,952	24
8 months to less than 12 months	4,667	1,655	29	5,042	1,732	34	4,506	1,523	34
12 months to less than 4 years	21,972	7,380	34	23,962	7,586	32	23,418	6,917	30

	2002			2003			2004
	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)
Total	55,370	20,525	37	57,551	21,223	37	55,810	19,294	35
All cases to less than 12 months	30,574	10,680	35	32,098	10,533	33	32,012	10,205	32
3 months to less than 4 months	6,439	1,695	26	6,605	1,619	25	6,592	1,419	22
4 months to less than 6 months	11,876	4,055	34	13,228	4,299	32	13,293	4,210	32
6 months to less than 8 months	7,843	2,956	38	7,606	2,679	35	7,568	2,659	35
8 months to less than 12 months	4,416	1,974	45	4,659	1,936	42	4,559	1,917	42
12 months to less than 4 years	24,796	9,804	40	25,453	10,690	42	23,798	9,089	38

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	2005			2006			2007
	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)	Population in sentence length band	Released	Release rate (%)
Total	54,616	17,296	32	52,987	13,666	26	53,835	11,428	21
All cases to less than 12 months	30,273	8,507	28	29,389	6,114	21	29,372	4,545	15
3 months to less than 4 months	6,440	1,068	17	6,474	722	11	6,613	358	5
4 months to less than 6 months	12,426	3,452	28	11,722	2,243	19	11,178	1,430	13
6 months to less than 8 months	7,158	2,336	33	6,915	1,777	26	6,788	1,442	21
8 months to less than 12 months	4,249	1,651	39	4,278	1,372	32	4,793	1,315	27
12 months to less than 4 years	24,343	8,789	36	23,598	7,552	32	24,463	6,883	28

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