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3 Jun 2009 : Column WA81

3 Jun 2009 : Column WA81

Written Answers

Wednesday 3 June 2009

Airports: Security

Question

Asked by Lord Laird

To ask Her Majesty's Government what rules apply to security screening of United Kingdom domestic passengers travelling from United Kingdom airports; and whether they will place a copy of the relevant regulations in the Library of the House. [HL3911]

The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Adonis): The Department for Transport is responsible for the national aviation security programme to which regulated airports within the UK are subject.

All passengers irrespective of destination are subject to the following standard security procedures; access controls, security questions, screening of hold and cabin baggage as well as passenger screening. Where necessary this screening can be enhanced by a hand search and further testing.

3 Jun 2009 : Column WA82

For security reasons it is not possible to provide more detail about the directions governing security and due to this sensitivity it is not appropriate to place this information in the Library of the House.

Asylum Seekers

Question

Asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many forced removals have there been since January to (a) the Democratic Republic of Congo, (b) Darfur, and (c) Zimbabwe. [HL3704]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord West of Spithead): The following table shows the number of removals and voluntary departures in quarter one 2009 to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, and Zimbabwe.

Information for quarter two 2009 will be available after the publication of the next quarterly Control of Immigration bulletin to be published in August.

Published statistics on immigration and asylum are available from the Library of the House and are available from the Home Office Research, Development and Statistics Directorate website at www. homeoffice. gov.uk/rds/immigration-asylum-stats.html.

Country of Destination	Enforced removals and voluntary departures
	Enforced removals and voluntary departures (3) (4)	Assisted Voluntary Returns (5)	Other Voluntary departures (6)	Total	Non-asylum cases refused entry at port and subsequently removed (7)	Grand Total
Total removals and voluntary departures from the United Kingdom, by type and destination (1), 01 2009 (2) (P)
Dem. Rep. of Congo	20	5	*	25	*	25
Sudan	5	5	5	15	*	15
Zimbabwe	15	50	10	70	5	75

(1) Destination as recorded on source database.

(2) Figures rounded to the nearest 5 and may not sum to the totals shown because of independent rounding.

(3) Due to a reclassification of removal categories, figures include asylum removals performed by enforcement officers using poll powers of removal and a small number of cases dealt with at juxtaposed controls.

(4) Since October 2006 figures include persons leaving under facilitated return schemes.

(5) Persons leaving under the Assisted Voluntary Return and the Assisted Voluntary Return for Irregular Migrants Programmes run by the International Organization for Migration. May include some on entry cases and some cases where enforcement action has been initiated.

(6) Persons who it has been established left the UK without informing the immigration authorities.

(7) Includes removals performed by immigration officers at ports using enforcement powers, cases dealt with at juxtaposed controls and a small number of cases who it has been established left the UK without informing the immigration authorities.

(p) Provisional figures. Removals and voluntary departures recorded on the system as at the dates on which the data extracts were taken. Figures will under record due to data cleansing and data matching exercises that take place after the extracts are taken.

Autism

Questions

Asked by Lord Morris of Manchester

To ask Her Majesty's Government further to the Written Answer by Lord Darzi of Denham on 30 April (WA 57), what steps they will take to ensure the Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust and other NHS Trusts meet the needs of children on the autism spectrum. [HL3816]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Darzi of Denham): This Government have announced a range of measures that will help to improve the lives of people with autistic spectrum conditions (ASCs), and their families—from childhood through to adulthood. We have announced wider policy support and investment in children with specialist or complex needs that will also help children with autism, including: action in response to the independent review of child and adolescent mental health services, and to the Bercow review of

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services for children with speech, language and communication difficulties; £770 million over three years invested by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) and the Department of Health in the Aiming Higher for Disabled Children programme; and Healthy Lives Brighter Futures, the strategy for children and young people's health, published in February 2009.

On 29 April, we launched a consultation on a future strategy to support adults with ASCs to live full and inclusive lives with access to the right care and support. The consultation runs until 15 September 2009. It will consider the needs of young people with ASC who are in transition to adult services.

More information on the consultation and the Government's action to improve the lives of people with autism can be found at www.dh.gov.uk/en/SocialCare/DeliveringadultsociaIcare/DH_079431.

The website for the Autism Education Trust which the Government fund is www.autismeducationtrust. org.uk/.

The Good Practice Guidance can be found at www.teachernet.gov.uk/wholeschool/sen/asds/

Further guidance recently published can be found at www.nationalstrategies.standards.dcsf.gov.uk/idp.

Asked by Lord Morris of Manchester

To ask Her Majesty's Government further to the Written Answer by Lord Darzi of Denham on 30 April (WA 57), whether the Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust will follow the recommendations of the Healthcare Commission in its report of 5 February; and whether the Trust changed the autism diagnosis in the case of Henry Spiller. [HL3817]

Lord Darzi of Denham: The East of England Strategic Health Authority has assured me that the Princess Alexandra Hospital National Health Service Trust has accepted all the clinical recommendations in the Healthcare Commission report of 5 February and that those recommendations have been implemented at the trust.

It would be inappropriate to share the details of an individual patient's diagnosis as it would be a breach of patient confidentiality.

Aviation: International Flights

Question

Asked by Lord Taylor of Holbeach

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether flights that begin and end in the United Kingdom but travel to other parts of the world will be categorised as international aviation under article 4 of the draft Climate Change Act 2008 (2020 Target, Credit Limit and Definitions) Order 2009. [HL3908]

The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change & Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Hunt of Kings Heath): A single flight which both begins and ends at aerodromes in the United Kingdom is a domestic flight, regardless

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of whether it enters airspace outside the United Kingdom. If a flight begins at an aerodrome in the United Kingdom and ends at an aerodrome outside the United Kingdom it is an international flight. Any corresponding return flight would also be an international flight.

Return flights which stop at aerodromes outside the United Kingdom are made up of two separate international flights. Such flights cannot, on any common- sense view, be treated as comprising a single flight which begins and ends at aerodromes in the United Kingdom; the stop at an aerodrome in another part of the world breaks the journey into two flights for the purposes of the definition in Article 4 of the order.

Aviation: Passengers

Question

Asked by Lord Laird

To ask Her Majesty's Government further to the Written Answer by Lord West of Spithead on 11 May (WA 154), under what powers air carriers ask for proof of identity of passengers flying between Northern Ireland and Great Britain; whether the Government or the police requested that they undertake such checks; and, if so, when. [HL3861]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord West of Spithead): Under the terms of the Aviation Security Act 1982, and as set out in the UK National Aviation Security Programme, airlines must ensure that for flights departing UK airports it is the same person who checked in hold baggage who then boards the aircraft. The Government do not specify how this should be achieved and airlines have introduced a variety of methods to achieve this.

Climate Change: Carbon Dioxide Emissions

Question

Asked by Lord Taylor of Holbeach

To ask Her Majesty's Government further to the Answers by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 19 March (Official Report, House of Lords, cols 329—32), what to date has been the fall in carbon dioxide emissions since 1990. [HL2660]

The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change & Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Hunt of Kings Heath): The table below shows the figures for carbon dioxide emissions since 1990.

3 Jun 2009 : Column WA85

Year	Net CO2 emissions (emissions minus removals)	Other greenhouse gases	Kyoto greenhouse gas basket
1990	592.9	182.7	773.0
1991	600.2	182.1	780.0
1992	583.0	174.0	755.3
1993	568.0	167.1	734.5
1994	561.9	162.5	723.9
1995	553.1	162.0	714.1
1996	575.3	160.3	734.7
1997	551.6	159.1	709.8
1998	553.6	152.2	705.4
1999	543.0	129.9	672.7
2000	551.1	123.8	674.7
2001	562.5	115.7	678.2
2002	544.9	111.3	656.4
2003	556.2	104.8	661.1
2004	555.9	102.0	658.6
2005	553.2	99.0	652.8
2006	551.1	96.4	647.9
2007	542.6	93.7	636.6
2008 (p)	531.8	91.6	623.8

Notes:

1. Figures shown for 2008 are provisional.

2. Figures for each individual gas include the land use, land-use change and forestry sector (LULUCF), but exclude emissions from UK Overseas Territories.

3. Kyoto basket total differs slightly from sum of individual pollutants above as the basket uses a narrower definition for the land use, land-use change and forestry sector (LULUCF), and includes emissions from UK Overseas Territories.

4. The entire time series is revised each year to take account of methodological improvements in the UK emissions inventory.

5. Emissions are presented as carbon dioxide equivalent in line with international reporting and carbon trading. To convert carbon dioxide into carbon equivalents, divide figures by 44/12.

6. Figures shown do not include any adjustment for the effect of the EU emissions trading scheme (EUETS), which was introduced in 2005.

Elections: Armed Forces

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