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24 Feb 2009 : Column 670W—continued
Antisocial Behaviour: Crime Prevention
Mr. Sanders: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what method her Department uses to apportion funding to local authorities to tackle anti-social behaviour. [257201]
Mr. Alan Campbell: Local authority funding generally takes the form of mainstream non-ring fenced grants or non-ring fenced area-based grant (ABG): a single capital pot designed to increase the funding flexibility and allow local areas much greater freedom to spend money in a way they see fit to support the delivery of local, regional and national priorities in their areas. The position in Wales is slightly different, whereby the funding for community safety partnerships has been consolidated into the crime reduction and antisocial behaviour national resource grant.
In both England and Wales it is for local partnerships to agree how the grants received should be allocated against locally determined priorities, including tackling antisocial behaviour.
Antisocial Behaviour: Enfield
Joan Ryan: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what steps her Department is taking to tackle antisocial behaviour in Enfield North constituency. [256779]
Mr. Alan Campbell: We have provided local agencies with a wide range of tools and powers to tackle antisocial behaviour to ensure they can tailor the response to each individual case. We have also provided front-line practitioners with updated guidance on providing support to victims and witnesses and the use of existing tools and powers, backed up with a programme of regional workshops.
Enfield has established a multi-agency partnership between the council and the police who co-ordinate all issues of antisocial behaviour in the borough, which includes Enfield North. The team work closely with all partners including social housing providers in an effort to tackle antisocial behaviour in the area.
Appropriate Adults
Mrs. Moon: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what progress has been made in her Department’s review of the role of appropriate adults; and when the new guidance on the matter is expected to be published; [251193]
(2) what assessment she has made of the merits of making it a statutory requirement that an appropriate adult be present at the police station in cases where the police have concerns about a suspect's mental state. [253686]
Mr. Coaker [holding answers 26 January 2009 and 2 February 2009]: Code of Practice C for the Detention, treatment and questioning of persons by police officers issued under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) 1984 requires that if an officer has any suspicion, or is told in good faith, that a person of any age may be mentally disordered or otherwise mentally vulnerable, or mentally incapable of understanding the significance of questions or replies that person shall be treated as mentally disordered or otherwise mentally vulnerable. In those circumstances, an appropriate adult must be called. The Review of PACE, published in August 2008 as a public consultation document, contained proposals on the role, training and use of appropriate adults.
We intend to publish the summary of responses to the consultation paper in March 2009.
Cannabis
Paul Flynn: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what research has been (a) evaluated and (b) commissioned by her Department on the likely effects of the change in classification of cannabis on (i) the numbers in prison and (ii) the cost of arrest, prosecution and imprisonment in each of the next five years; and if she will make a statement. [245482]
Mr. Alan Campbell [holding answer 27 January 2009]: The likely effects of the reclassification of cannabis to a Class B drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 have been evaluated in the regulatory impact assessment (IA)(1) produced to accompany the Parliamentary Order. This IA is an internal evaluation. Based on existing evidence the IA makes a series of key assumptions; it forecasts potential liabilities associated with the legislative and the proposed enforcement change. The IA is published at:
Estimates of unit costs applied to criminal justice system outcomes within the IA were obtained from the agencies involved and from relevant research where available. As a result, volumes and figures stated are broad estimates; they do not necessarily reflect actual costs in any particular situation or point in time.
In respect of prison places, the IA identifies potential additional prison places for cannabis possession offences; it estimates a potential increase in prison place requirement of 21 places over five years.
For supply, trafficking and production offences the impact assessment clearly sets out the reasons why an assessment on prison places was not made. This includes the fact that the maximum sentence prescribed by the 1971 Act will remain unchanged at 14 years.
The overall estimate change in the enforcement liability associated with cannabis possession including arrest and prosecution can be found in Table 6 of the IA as set out.
(1) Please note the Impact Assessment was re laid on 16 January 2009. A drafting error in the IA was identified on 19 December 2008. Following this, the impact assessment was withdrawn from the OPSI website on 23 December 2009. A full review of the IA was undertaken and the revised document is now in the public domain. For a full explanation of the drafting error please see response to PQ 24583. The error identified in the document does not affect the estimates of costs of arrest, prosecution or prison numbers.
| Table 6: Estimated change in enforcement liability against cannabis possession | |||||||
| £ million | |||||||
| Criminal Justice System | |||||||
| Year | Police | CPS | HMCS( 1) | NOMS | Total CJS | Non-legal aid defence | Total |
| (1) HMCS costs include court costs, costs from PNDs, legal aid and central funds costs. | |||||||
Paul Flynn: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment she has made of the likely effect of the reclassification of cannabis on (a) the numbers using cannabis and (b) the numbers using other illegal drugs. [245483]
Mr. Alan Campbell [holding answer 13 January 2009]: In respect of the movement to Class B alone on the numbers using cannabis there is no claim that this alone will act as a deterrent on cannabis use.
The Impact Assessment (IA)(1) on the reclassification of cannabis looks at reclassification alongside a step change in enforcement response and the potential change in the estimated population of cannabis users. Based on existing evidence the IA makes a series of key assumptions; it forecasts potential liabilities and volumes associated with the legislative and proposed enforcement response. These assumptions include a reduction in the population of serious cannabis users following recent British Crime Survey trends, desistance from users ‘getting older’ and increased desistance of users is assumed following more robust contact with police and the Criminal Justice System. The full IA can be found at:
Over the seven year period examined in the impact assessment there is estimated to be a desistance of an additional 23,000 serious cannabis users under
reclassification alongside the associated enforcement response. The estimated difference in total population of serious cannabis users under reclassification and the enforcement response is set out in Table 8 of the aforementioned impact assessment.
There has been no assessment of how cannabis reclassification will impact on those using other illegal drugs.
(1) In preparing the response to this PQ a minor drafting error was identified in the Impact Assessment (IA). As a consequence the IA was withdrawn from the public domain. A revised version was re laid in Parliament on 16 January 2009.
The erroneous sentence in the IA stated:
“Over the entire period, the change option is estimated to result in the desistence of 72,000 additional serious cannabis users”
and appeared on page 15 of the original IA as found on the OPSI website. The cited figure of 72,000 was incorrectly quoted as a result of misinterpretation of the figures in Table 8 as relating to annual levels of desistance, rather than the cumulative level of desistance. The correct figure of 23,000 additionally desisting over seven years was cited in the preceding sentence and contained in Table 8 of the IA. Following the identification of this error a full review of all figures and tabular information contained in the IA has been conducted. There have been no errors in the original calculations contained within the IA.
| Table 8: Estimated total population of serious cannabis offenders by year | ||||
| Population of offenders, do nothing | Population of offenders, change | Difference | Percentage | |
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what training police officers receive to allow them to recognise cannabis. [257043]
Jacqui Smith: All student police officers are issued with notes which cover drugs and their supply, importation and manufacture. The identification of classified drugs is also dealt with in a case study exercise.
As part of their training, it is common practice for student police officers to undertake a familiarisation exercise with samples of a variety of drugs. This helps student officers to recognise different drugs, both visually and by smell. Due care must be exercised to ensure that any illegal drugs used for training purposes are closely monitored and controlled.
Children: Internet
Margaret Moran: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether she plans to ensure that social networking sites act upon requests from adoptive parents and adoption agencies where they have a reasonable fear for the safety of the adopted child via such sites. [257324]
Beverley Hughes: I have been asked to reply.
The Home Office Task Force on Child Protection on the Internet published good practice guidance for social networking sites last year. The guidance provides recommendations for how the managers of such sites should deal with incidents of bullying and other forms of abuse or threats to children’s safety, and to make it easy for all young people and their parents or guardians to report their concerns.
This guidance is being promoted by the newly formed UK Council for Child Internet Safety and has formed the core of the new European Agreement on Social Networking. Social networking sites are expected to inform the European Commission about their individual safety policies and how they will put these principles in place by April 2009.
The guidance may be downloaded from:
A copy has been placed in the Libraries.
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