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HM Courts Service Estates
The Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor (Mr. Jack Straw): I will be making a written ministerial statement tomorrow on this matter.
Solicitor-General
Assisted Suicide
The Solicitor-General (Vera Baird): My right hon. Friend the Attorney-General has made the following written ministerial statement:
Following the House of Lords judgment in Purdy v DPP the Director of Public Prosecutions issued his interim policy document on the 23 September 2009, setting out the particular factors he would take account of when deciding whether to give consent to the prosecution of a person for the offence of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring (assisting) another to commit or attempt to commit suicide.
This policy was issued on an interim basis and at the same time the Director announced he would start a consultation exercise that would last for three months. He is aiming to then publish his finalised policy in the Spring of 2010. Copies of the interim policy and the consultation paper have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
The policy does not change the law but responds to the House of Lords judgment in the case of Purdy v DPP.
It has never been the rule in England and Wales that suspected criminal offences must automatically be prosecuted. Where there is sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of a conviction for assisted suicide, the Director must, as with all offences, go on to consider whether a prosecution is needed in the public interest. In exercising that discretion, the Director takes into account factors both for and against prosecution. These are set out in the code for Crown Prosecutors. The consideration of evidence followed by a consideration of whether a prosecution is needed in the public interest constitutes the full code test.
In the case of Purdy v DPP the House of Lords considered that in the special case of assisted suicide the Director should issue a policy document setting out the further public interest factors that may apply to this specific offence in order to give prosecutors and persons in Ms Purdy's position extra clarity as to the exercise of the prosecutorial discretion.
Each case is unique and will be considered on its own facts and merits with prosecutors continuing to apply the factors in the code for Crown Prosecutors as well as the new interim policy.
Transport
Urban Congestion Performance Fund
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr. Sadiq Khan): I am today announcing adjustments to the second payment tranche for the urban congestion performance fund. This follows the statement on 23 February 2009 when the 10 largest urban areas in England received £10.7 million to study and address the causes of urban congestion.
My Department has a Public Service Agreement indicator regarding journey time on main roads into urban areas. The indicator states that by 2010-11 the 10 largest urban areas in England will meet the congestion targets set in their local transport plans relating to movement on main roads into city centres. The national indicator will be deemed to have been met if, on target routes in these areas, an average increase in travel of 4.4 per cent. is accommodated with an average increase of 3.6 per cent. in person journey time per mile.
The publication of the "Transport Statistics Bulletin, Road Statistics 2008: Traffic, Speeds and Congestion", on 25 June 2009 included revised performance data for the urban congestion indicator for the academic year 2007-08.
The overall national data now shows that the average person journey time across all the target routes has improved by 3.1 per cent. between the baseline (using 2004-05 and 2005-06 data) and 2007-08. The original announcement in February stated that it was a fall of 3.0 per cent. At the same time the average level of travel fell by 2.7 per cent. across all the target routes, whereas the original published figure was 3.3 per cent.
The individual data have also been adjusted for a number of areas. Based on this revised performance data, the West Midlands will now receive the modified payments as detailed in the table:
| Urban Area | Original Tranche 2 payment announced on 23 February 2009 | Revised Tranche 2 payment |
Leicester's performance data have also been adjusted from a fall in journey time of 0.1 per cent. to an increase of 1.1 per cent., but this is still better than their trajectory target. As the priority of the performance fund is to enable the urban areas to identify and tackle the causes of congestion, it has been decided to retain Leicester's original performance fund allocation of £361,226. No other area had a significant change in their performance data for 2007-08.
The performance fund is worth a total of £60 million over four years, and today's announcement will have seen a total of £22.9 million paid to the 10 areas. A further £35 million is available over the next two financial years, and will also be awarded on a performance basis.
Wales
Legislative Competence Order
The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain): I am pleased to inform the House that the proposed National Assembly for Wales (Legislative Competence) (Housing) Order 2009 relating to Domestic Fire Safety was laid on 7 October, as Command Paper (Cm 7715). This Order has been proposed by a backbench member of the National Assembly for Wales, Ann Jones, and has the support of the Welsh Assembly Government.
Copies of this can be found in the Vote Office and the Library. I have written to the Welsh Affairs Committee and to the House of Lords Constitution Committee to request they undertake pre-legislative scrutiny.
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