The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ivan Lewis on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, how many (a) permanent and (b) non-permanent staff were employed in her Department on 1 June 2014.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
As of 1 June 2014, my Department employed 155 permanent members of staff made up of Home Civil Servants and Northern Ireland Civil Servants staff seconded to the Northern Ireland Office. Three part-time members of staff are engaged on an annual contract.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kate Hoey on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, who the beneficiaries in Northern Ireland of the Royal Prerogative of Mercy granted by means of a Warrant under the Royal Sign Manual were in the last 25 years; and if she will make a statement.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
As the hon Member is aware, the assessment of my Department is that to release the names of individuals granted the RPM years ago would not be appropriate, given the time that has passed since the RPM was last used and the potential legal issues this would raise. There are, of course, means by which names of RPM recipients become public, including in the course of legal proceedings, which is a matter for the courts.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what steps her Department is taking to promote Northern Ireland’s natural beauty to boost its tourism.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
Northern Ireland is one of the most beautiful parts of the United Kingdom and the televising around the world of the G8 summit in Fermanagh last year and the recent Giro d’Italia Grande Partenza will doubtless result in new tourist visits.
The promotion of tourism is a devolved matter, however I take every opportunity to invite those whom I meet to come and visit and enjoy Northern Ireland for themselves.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that local colleges train the people of Northern Ireland with the appropriate skills to enable further growth in film and television production in Northern Ireland.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
This is a devolved matter but I took the opportunity of raising it with the Northern Ireland Minister for Employment and Learning, on the hon Member’s behalf, when I met him on 18 June.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what steps her Department has taken to ensure further opportunities for Northern Ireland’s film industry are secured.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
The hon Member will appreciate that this is a devolved matter. However I take every opportunity to promote the Northern Ireland film industry which has been significantly boosted by the high end television tax credit introduced by my Rt hon Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
I have met the senior team at Home Box Office on two occasions. Last month I wrote to the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills to coincide with the publication of the UK Creative Industries International Strategy in China, in order to promote some 250 media production companies based in Northern Ireland that are already delivering on a global stage and offering world-class talent across the sector.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Dan Jarvis on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Attorney General, what recent steps his Department has taken to increase the number of rape convictions.
Oliver Heald
Increasing the number of rape convictions continues to be a priority in the criminal justice system. On 6 June 2014, a Rape Action Plan was jointly published by the police and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which sets out a series of actions designed to improve the criminal justice response in rape cases. This followed a Rape National Scrutiny Panel led by the Director of Public Prosecutions and the National Policing lead for rape, which considered the investigation and prosecution of rape cases including their referral from the police to the CPS. The Action plan can be found on the CPS website at; http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/equality/vaw/rape_action_plan.pdf
“
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Richard Fuller on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what representations he has had on including insolvency litigation in the scope of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012.
Mr Shailesh Vara
We have recently received representations from insolvency practitioners, including the Association of Business Recovery Professionals (R3), regarding a permanent exemption for insolvency litigation from the scope of the costs and funding provisions in Part 2 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act 2012. Ministry of Justice officials have met with R3 on this matter.
The LASPO reforms were implemented generally from 1 April 2013, although they were delayed for insolvency proceedings in order to allow stakeholders time to adjust. The Government’s position remains – as announced by written ministerial statement in May 2012 (24 May 2012: Col 94WS) – that the reforms should apply to insolvency proceedings from April 2015.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners serving sentences in open conditions have previously absconded for their current or previous establishments (a) once, (b) twice, (c) three times and (d) four or more times.
Jeremy Wright
Keeping the public safe is our priority. Absconds and escapes have reached record lows under this Government but each incident is taken seriously. Immediate changes have already been ordered to tighten up the system as a matter of urgency. Prisoners will no longer be transferred to open conditions or allowed out on temporary release if they have previously absconded, escaped, or attempted to do either.
My officials are currently working to provide the information requested. I will write to you in due course.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what average time was left to be served on a sentence for prisoners serving (a) determinate, (b) indeterminate, (c) life and (d) all sentences moved from closed to open conditions within the prison estate in each year since 2010.
Jeremy Wright
We do not centrally hold data on the number of prisoners transferred from closed to open prisons for the time period requested – or the type of sentence which they were serving. Consequently, the information requested could be obtained only at disproportionate cost, as it would involve a manual trawl through the records of every prisoner who has formed part of the prison population since 2010, to identify if they had/have ever been held in open conditions during the time period requested.
Determinate sentence prisoners should not generally be moved to open prison if they have more than 2 years to serve to their earliest release date, unless assessment of a prisoner’s individual risks and needs support earlier categorisation to open conditions. Such cases must have the reasons for their categorisation fully documented and confirmed in writing by the Governing Governor.
Indeterminate sentence prisoners do not have fixed release dates, so even if the data on transfers was readily available, it would not be possible to identify a length of time left to be served in these cases.
Depending on the length of tariff and the risk they pose, indeterminate sentenced prisoners (ISPs – both those serving life and IPP sentences) move through their sentence via a series of progressive transfers into lower security establishments in the closed estate and then usually into open conditions. ISPs may be considered for transfer to open conditions up to 3 years before the expiry of their minimum tariff. The decision to transfer ISPs to open conditions is a categorisation decision which is a matter for the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State may take this decision after seeking advice from the Parole Board – or without seeking advice from the Board, where the prisoners demonstrate exceptional progress.
Placing a prisoner in open conditions serves two main purposes. Firstly, it facilitates the eventual resettlement of prisoners into the community, in conditions more similar to those that they will face in the community than closed conditions can provide. Secondly, it allows for risk to be assessed in order to inform release decisions and, should the prisoner secure release, to inform risk management plans for ongoing supervision in the community. Thus, for many prisoners who have spent a considerable amount of time in custody, this can assist in their successful reintegration in the community and help protect the public. To release these prisoners directly from a closed prison without the resettlement benefits of the open estate could lead to higher levels of post-release re-offending.
Keeping the public safe is our priority. That is why this Government has taken action on both releases on temporary licence (ROTL) and absconds from prison. We commissioned a fundamental review of ROTL policy and practice last year and, in March, announced a package of measures to ensure that the public was properly protected. We have brought forward some of those measures so that they begin to take effect immediately; particularly with more serious offenders, where the review concluded that an enhanced risk assessment approach should be taken.
The public have understandable concerns about the failure of some prisoners to return from temporary release from open prison. Keeping the public safe is our priority and we will not allow the actions of a small minority of offenders to undermine public confidence in the prison system. The number of temporary release failures remains very low; less that one failure in every 1,000 releases and about five in every 100,000 releases involving alleged offending, but we take each and every incident seriously. The Government has already ordered immediate changes to tighten up the system as a matter of urgency. With immediate effect, prisoners will no longer be transferred to open conditions if they have previously absconded from open prisons; or if they have failed to return or reoffended whilst released on temporary licence.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2014-06-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the Answer of 13 May 2014, Official Report, column 494W, on prisons: mobile telephones, when data on mobile telephones seized in prisons in 2013 will be made available.
Jeremy Wright
The number of mobile phone and SIM card seizures for the first six months of 2013 was 3398. The data for the whole of 2013 will be available by the end of August 2014, broken down by prison establishment.
One seizure may constitute a handset containing one SIM card or media card, a handset only, or a SIM card only.
All figures provided have been drawn from live administrative data systems which may be amended at any time. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system.