Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to implement statutory measures to ban the sale of zombie knives and machetes.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Between 18 April and 16 June 2023, the Government ran a consultation on new knife legislation proposals to tackle the use of machetes and other bladed articles in criminal activity. The Government published the response to the consultation on 30 August 2023.
Alongside other proposals, the Government intends to ban the import, sale and possession of zombie style knives and machetes.
The Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) (Amendment, Surrender and Compensation) Order 2024 was laid in Parliament on 25 January 2024.
Once the legislation has been approved by Parliament, a surrender scheme will be launched this summer to remove these knives from our streets.
Once the surrender scheme has been completed, the manufacture, supply, sale and possession of zombie-style knives and machetes will be outlawed from 24 September.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that unaccompanied child asylum seekers arriving in the UK are not placed in adult prisons.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
Determining the age of a young person is a difficult task and therefore, the age assessment process for immigration purposes contains safeguards.
Where a new arrival does not have genuine documentary evidence of their age and their claimed age is doubted, an initial age decision is conducted as a first step to prevent individuals who are clearly an adult or minor from being subjected unnecessarily to a more substantive age assessment and ensure that new arrivals are routed into the correct accommodation and processes for assessing their asylum or immigration claim. The lawfulness of the initial decision on age process was endorsed by the Supreme Court in the case of R (on the application of BF (Eritrea)) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] UKSC 38.
Where doubt remains and an individual cannot be assessed to be significantly over 18, they will be treated as a minor for immigration purposes until further assessment of their age by a local authority.
The Home Office initial decision on age is not binding on the courts, and where the Court has doubt whether the individual is a minor or not, the courts will take a decision on the age of an individual before them based on the available evidence. This decision would then determine the type of detention estate someone is sent to if given a custodial sentence or remanded in custody. If an individual is sent to an adult prison and is later found to be a child, they can be moved to the youth custody estate if there continues to be a need to detain them.
The recent legislative reforms introduced by this government will improve the accuracy of the scientific age assessment outcomes, minimising the risk that a person will be incorrectly treated as either an adult or a minor and ensure that age-appropriate services and care are reserved for genuine minors.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many unaccompanied child asylum seekers have been placed in HMP Elmley in Kent; and how many are still held there.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The Home Office does not collect data on the number of age dispute cases that have arisen in adult prisons and is unable to confirm the statistics referenced in the Guardian article, which are derived from local authority responses to an FOI request. Our published data on age assessment can be accessed here. Asylum and resettlement datasets - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Furthermore, the Home Office published data on age disputes aggregates the age disputes resolved by including the outcomes of initial age decisions by the Home Office taken at the point of first contact, comprehensive Merton compliant age assessments conducted by social workers and any subsequent legal challenge into one category.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to protect police officers following a security breach of an IT supplier to the Metropolitan Police.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Digital ID, an IT supplier to the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) advised them on 26 August 2023 that they had been subject to a ransomware attack, potentially putting at risk data for officers and staff.
The MPS immediately put in place appropriate security measures following the incident and reported the incident to the National Crime Agency and the Information Commissioner’s Office.
The Home Office, along with the National Crime Agency and National Cyber Security Centre is engaged with both the MPS and Digital ID to investigate and provide support.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what is the total cost payable to the government of Rwanda under the agreement with that country in the event that no migrants are sent there from the UK.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The UK has provided Rwanda with an initial investment of £120m into its economic development and growth as part of the Economic Transformation and Integration Fund (ETIF). Investment has been focused in areas such as education, healthcare, agriculture, infrastructure, and job creation. A separate advance payment of £20m was also paid last year to support initial set up costs for the relocation of individuals.
Funding will also be provided to support the delivery of asylum operations, accommodation, and integration in Rwanda. Costs and payments will depend on the number of individuals relocated, the timing of when this happens, and the outcomes of individual cases. We will not enter into speculation as to what the final costs of the partnership may be nor provide a running commentary.
Legal proceedings are ongoing, and we have been granted permission to appeal to the Supreme Court with a hearing scheduled to take place in October. We always knew that our policy was ambitious and novel, and that it would be tested in the courts, but we have also been clear we are committed to this partnership and will continue to robustly defend this policy so we can make it a reality.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what powers contained in the Illegal Migration Act 2023 they have used to date.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The Illegal Migration Act received Royal Assent on 20 July 2023.
The bans on re-entry, settlement or citizenship to people who come to the UK illegally came into force from Royal Assent.
As is standard practice for any legislation, commencement of wider measures in the Act will take place over the coming months.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government why the murals of cartoon characters at the Kent Intake Unit asylum centre were found to be 'too welcoming'; and under what legal powers they were removed.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
We provide high-quality facilities to minors upon immediate arrival in the UK at Kent Intake Unit and all their needs are provided for.
The unit works closely with Kent Children’s Services to ensure the unaccompanied children are processed and placed into appropriate care as quickly as possible.
We continue to prioritise work with local authorities (LA), and Kent County Council, to ensure that children are transferred into local authority care as soon as possible via the National Transfer Scheme (NTS). We have supported this through our incentivised funding pilots to all local authorities across the UK, which aimed to encourage quicker transfers into local authority care.
Between December 22 and February 23, the Home Office increased our incentivised offer to £15,000 per child, to allow local authorities to invest more money in long term infrastructure to support the children they received. We will continue to provide incentivised funding throughout 2023-24, with every local authority receiving £6,00 for each unaccompanied child transferred from a dedicated UASC hotel into local authority care within five working days. This funding is in addition to the contribution made by the Home Office to LA’s receiving children through the NTS, which can equate to £52,195 per child, per year, up to the age of 18.
Recent figures show that 70% of UASCs are over 16. Further details can be found at the Asylum and Resettlement datasets – Gov.UK: Asylum and resettlement datasets - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)