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9 Jun 2009 : Column 798W—continued
Mr. Grieve: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many probation offices have closed in each of the last five years. [278369]
Mr. Straw: Information on the number of probation offices closed in each of the last five years is not held or recorded centrally. To obtain this information could be achieved only at disproportionate cost because it would entail gathering information from archived files and checking with individual probation areas.
Probation: Wales
Mr. Caton: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what recent assessment he has made of the effect of reductions in jobs in the probation service in the South Wales Probation Area on service delivery. [277306]
Maria Eagle: The Director of Offender Management in Wales (DOM) is responsible for ensuring that South Wales Probation Trust delivers the required services with the available resources. This is managed through an agreed contract between both parties.
The management of the Probation Trust’s resources to deliver services rests with its management team and its board members. There is a close working relationship between the DOM and the Probation Trust to achieve this, which ensures that financial planning assumptions are fully taken into account in the Probation Trust’s development and delivery of services. This would involve the best value use and re-investment of resources toward front line services to ensure quality of delivery is maintained.
Restorative Justice
Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many people have appealed against orders requiring them to take part in high-visibility community payback schemes. [278104]
Maria Eagle: There have been no appeals against community or suspended sentence orders on the grounds that offenders are required to undertake their community payback sentences on high visibility work projects.
Suicide
Mr. Gordon Prentice: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what recent representations he has received in support of decriminalising the offence of assisting suicide; and if he will make a statement. [278244]
Maria Eagle: Between 14 January 2009, when the Coroners and Justice Bill was introduced, and 4 June 2009, we received 177 letters, directly or through their Members of Parliament, from people who support decriminalising the offence of assisting suicide in certain circumstances and had one meeting with the chief executive of the Dignity in Dying organisation. We also received 76 letters from people who oppose such a change in the law.
Torture: Inspections
Mrs. Humble: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice pursuant to the written ministerial statement of 31 March 2009, Official Report, column 56WS, on Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture, which bodies he has designated for the regular inspection of military barracks, training establishments and places of detention (a) in the UK and (b) overseas to satisfy the requirements of the Convention; and what plans he has for the designation of additional bodies. [278378]
Mr. Wills:
Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons inspects the Military Corrective Training Centre in Colchester at the invitation of the Ministry of Defence. I have asked officials from my Department to work with the Ministry of Defence to look at ways of ensuring that inspection of all other service custody within the UK is compliant with the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (OPCAT), and that all service custody facilities in the UK are subject to inspection by the UK National Preventive Mechanism (NPM).
With regard to inspection of any places of detention overseas, the Government’s position is that the UN Convention Against Torture and the OPCAT do not apply extra-territorially.
OPCAT requires that the NPM should be functionally independent of Government. The addition of inspection bodies to the NPM will be a matter for discussion between Government and the NPM. If it is necessary to add new inspection bodies to the NPM, or if bodies within the NPM are restructured or renamed, the Government will notify Parliament accordingly.
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Angling: Licensing
Mr. Benyon: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much was collected in fees for (a) junior concession, (b) senior concession, (c) disabled concession and (d) full season rod licences in each year since 1997. [276782]
Huw Irranca-Davies: The following table indicates the amount collected for full, senior, disabled and junior rod licences issued by the Environment Agency (EA) since 1999. Prior to this, the EA used different systems to store rod licence information. Such information is, therefore, not available in the categories required.
| Trout, coarse and salmon | ||||
| £ | ||||
| Full | Senior | Disabled | Junior | |
| Source: The Environment Agency's rod licence database. | ||||
Civil Service Agencies: Boats
Mr. Anthony Wright: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many ships and boats have been (a) owned, (b) leased and (c) hired by or on behalf of (i) the Marine and Fisheries Agency, (ii) the Environment Agency, (iii) Natural England, (iv) the Joint Nature Conservation Committee, (v) the Sea Fisheries Committees and (vi) the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science in each of the last three financial years; how many operational days each of those vessels has spent at sea at each agency’s expense in that period; and what expenditure each agency incurred on purchasing, leasing and hiring such vessels in each such year. [277262]
Huw Irranca-Davies: The Marine and Fisheries Agency (MFA) does not own any vessels, but it does have an agreement with the Royal Navy for the provision of ships and personnel for fishery protection duties.
| Royal Navy Fishery Protection Vessels | ||||
| Class of ship | Total number of operational days at sea | Number of vessels available for use | Cost (£000) | |
Additionally the MFA hire inshore vessels for specific fisheries enforcement work, but information on number of operational days at sea is not readily available.
| Hire of inshore vessels | |
| £ | |
The Environment Agency (EA) currently owns 41 marine vessels to fulfil its statutory duties primarily for marine environmental monitoring and fisheries enforcement. Four of these vessels are 16 m coastal survey vessels focussing on environmental monitoring. The other vessels are smaller, ranging in size from 5-12 m, with duties differing across fisheries enforcement, flood defence inspections and harbour duties as well as environmental monitoring. The EA also hired eight vessels for data collection activities for flood and coastal risk management and marine monitoring in 2008-09 some of which is expected to continue in 2009-10. The marine vessel fleet has been subject to a detailed review over the last two years. The outcome of the review will lead to a rationalisation of this fleet from 41 to 25 vessels over the next three years to improve efficiency and increase utilisation of the remaining assets.
The number of vessels, operational days and expenditure from 2006-09 is set out in the table:
| Number of operational days | Expenditure (£000) | Number of vessels owned | Number of vessels hired | |
| Source: EA’s Marine Monitoring and Vessel Review Project 2009 | ||||
Natural England uses vessels for a range of activities including: site monitoring; Environmental Impact Assessment (e.g. as a result of the Napoli incident); intertidal and sub-tidal surveys (e.g. sediment and invertebrate surveys in The Wash); compliance with Health and Safety legislation and policy (e.g. diving operations); cetacean surveys (Lyme Bay); the Lundy no-take zone monitoring program (including patrols and enforcement); servicing our National Nature Reserves (NNRs); and a range of formal visits (politicians, journalists and Natural England officials) to specific sites.
Natural England owns a number of small vessels (no ships) including:
Rigid Inflatable Boat (RIB) that services Lundy Island Marine Nature Reserve;
One mud pump, one riverboat, workboats, one traditional reed lighter, trailboats, one floating pontoon and inflatable boats which are all used to service a number of NNRs and related work on the Broads.
In addition, the organisation owns a small number of dinghies which are used on some of their NNRs.
The following table shows the number of vessel days from vessels either owned, leased and hired by, or on behalf of, Natural England for the years 2006-07, 2007-08 and 2008-09, together with estimations of cost.
| Owned (days) | Leased | Hired by or on behalf of (days) | Total (days) | Cost (£) | |
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