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  • Nicholas Brown – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Nicholas Brown – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Brown on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what plans the Government has to publish the outcome of its consultation with local authorities on the resettling of child refugees under the Immigration Act 2016.

    James Brokenshire

    The UK Government takes it’s responsibility in all cases involving children seriously and we will continue to ensure that all unaccompanied children are provided with appropriate care, regardless of their route to the UK.

    It is important that we work with local authorities to understand their capacity to support all unaccompanied children and ensure their needs can be met. That is why my officials are working closely with the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Department for Education to ensure consultation with local authorities is consistent and coordinated across all resettlement and relocation programmes. Consultation with local government partners will take place over the coming weeks and Parliament will be updated in due course.

    We are keen to ensure that there is a more equitable distribution of unaccompanied children across the UK and that no local authority is required to take more children than they can support.

    The Home Office provides funding to local authorities for the care of unaccompanied asylum seeking children and recently announced new enhanced rates to support the transfer scheme. We will continue to measure the impacts on local authorities, but are clear that funding for unaccompanied asylum seeking children and refugees must be aligned, regardless of the route of entry for the child.

  • Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Smith on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average time taken was to decide fee waiver applications in the last 12 months.

    James Brokenshire

    The average time taken between January 2015 and December 2015 to consider whether an application meets the fee waiver requirements is 95 calendar days. These results represent the time taken with both asylum and non asylum based fee waiver considerations.

    January 2015 – December 2015 was taken as the 12 month time frame to fall in line with data that is published.

  • Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Smith on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average time taken was to decide applications for the change of conditions of leave granted on the basis of family or private life during the last 12 months.

    James Brokenshire

    The average time taken between January 2015 and December 2015 to consider whether an application meets the requirements to change a condition code is 83 calendar days.

    January 2015 – December 2015 was taken as the 12 month time frame to fall in line with data that is published.

  • Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Smith on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has service standards in place for considering fee waiver applications.

    James Brokenshire

    There are no service standards for fee waiver applications.

  • Stuart C. McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Stuart C. McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stuart C. McDonald on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many unsuccessful refugee family reunion applications during the last three years were rejected on the basis of the child being 18 years or older.

    James Brokenshire

    The family reunion policy allows those granted refugee status or humanitarian protection in the UK to sponsor their pre-flight family members, i.e. spouse or partner and children under the age of 18, who formed part of the family unit before the sponsor fled their country, to reunite with them in the UK.

    Information on the applicant’s relationship with their sponsor is not collated centrally. As such it is not possible to identify how many applicants have applied for family reunion as adult children aged 18 or over or what the outcome was.

  • Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Percy on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many cases of online abuse on (a) Facebook, (b) Twitter and (c) all other social media have been reported to the police since 2010.

    Mr John Hayes

    The Home Office do not hold the information requested.

    However, we have introduced an ‘online flag’ as part of the police recorded crime data collection. This allows police forces to record online instances of abuse and other crimes such as stalking, harassment, sexual offences and others. These offences could have taken place solely online, or had an online element to them. These data are currently still in development but will be published in due course. However, it will not be possible to split the data according to type of social media used (if any).

  • Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Percy on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people have been convicted of offences of online abuse on (a) Facebook and (b) Twitter under the Communications Act 2003 since 2010.

    Karen Bradley

    The Home Office do not hold the information requested. The Ministry of Justice hold data on the number of offenders found guilty at all courts in England and Wales.

  • Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Percy on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Education on tackling online abuse in schools.

    Karen Bradley

    The UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS) is co-chaired by Ministers from Department for Education, Home Office and Department for Culture Media and Sport. This brings together industry, law enforcement, academia, charities and parenting groups to help to keep children and young people safe online. As part of this work, the UK’s Communications regulator, Ofcom, published best practice guidance for social media platforms to encourage responsible practice from industry in December 2015.

    The Department for Education recognises that educating young people is key to tackling cyberbullying and protecting children from online abuse. All schools must have a behaviour policy which includes measures to prevent and tackle all forms of bullying, including cyberbullying. To help schools to develop effective measures the Department for Education has produced advice which provides a definition of cyberbullying and outlines the steps schools can take to deal with bullying.

    Search powers included in the Education Act 2011 have given teachers stronger powers to tackle cyber-bullying (via text message or the internet) by providing a specific power to search for and, if necessary, delete inappropriate images (or files) on electronic devices, including mobile phones. The Department has also issued advice for parents and carers on cyberbullying which specifies the tell-tale signs that it is happening and includes advice on what do when it occurs.

    The Government has invested £3.85 million in a new phase of our This is Abuse campaign, which tackles abuse within teenage relationships and was launched in March. The National Crime Agency’s Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) has developed a comprehensive education programme, called Thinkuknow, which provides targeted advice to children, parents and carers, including on how to use social media safely.

  • Stuart C. McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Stuart C. McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stuart C. McDonald on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many refugee family reunion applications to bring children of 18 years or older into the UK were submitted in the last three years; and how many of those applications were successful.

    James Brokenshire

    The family reunion policy allows those granted refugee status or humanitarian protection in the UK to sponsor their pre-flight family members, i.e. spouse or partner and children under the age of 18, who formed part of the family unit before the sponsor fled their country, to reunite with them in the UK.

    Information on the applicant’s relationship with their sponsor is not collated centrally. As such it is not possible to identify how many applicants have applied for family reunion as adult children aged 18 or over or what the outcome was.

  • Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andrew Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Smith on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has service standards for considering applications for the change of conditions of leave granted on the basis of family or private life.

    James Brokenshire

    There are no service standards for a change of conditions application.