Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of (a) signing and (b) ratifying the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The UK Government considers that the current domestic framework and legislation already prevents arbitrary arrests, prohibits torture and degrading treatment, and holds the Security and Intelligence Agencies to account. We therefore currently have no plans to sign or ratify the Convention on Enforced Disappearance.
We strongly condemn any instances of enforced disappearance internationally. We urge states to fully investigate any allegations, prosecute those responsible and provide justice to victims.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of signing the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance under the UN.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Government considers that the current domestic framework and legislation already prevents arbitrary arrests, prohibits torture and degrading treatment, and holds the Security and Intelligence Agencies to account. We therefore currently have no plans to sign or ratify the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearances.
We strongly condemn any instances of enforced disappearance internationally. We urge states to fully investigate any allegations, prosecute those responsible and provide justice to victims.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) non-disclosure and (b) other confidentiality agreements relating to (i) employment, (ii) bullying, (iii) misconduct and (iii) harassment cases have been agreed by his Department in each year since 1 January 2010; and how much money from the public purse has been spent on (a) legal costs and (b) financial settlements for such agreements in each year since 1 January 2010.
Answered by Mike Freer
This information requested is not held centrally.
Cabinet Office guidance on settlement agreements, special severance payments on termination of employment and confidentiality clauses can be found here: Civil Service settlement agreements, special severance payments and confidentiality clauses - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the letter sent to all MPs on 13 September 2021 from the Minister for Safeguarding and Afghan Resettlement regarding an update on casework to the Home Office on Afghanistan, whether his Department will respond to correspondence from hon. Members on the further evacuation of Afghan individuals if the case (a) has and (b) has not already been raised by an hon. Member with her Department.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Given the very difficult circumstances in Afghanistan, we cannot pursue cases concerning Afghan people in country in the usual ways. The Home Office is logging all the cases it has received, and it is considering how this data will be used in the future. Accordingly, please signpost individuals to gov.uk to check for the latest information about Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy: further information on eligibility criteria and offer details - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) and the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme (ACRS) (Afghan citizens’ resettlement scheme - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)) rather than seek to pursue cases on their behalf.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prosecutions have been made in (a) England, (b) Wales, (c) Thames Valley and (d) Oxford West and Abingdon constituency under the Vagrancy Act 1824 in each calendar year since 2015.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The Ministry of Justice has published information on prosecutions under the Vagrancy Act 1824, up to December 2020, in the ‘Principal offence proceedings and outcomes by Home Office offence code’ data tool, available here:
In the data tool linked above, you can use the ‘Offence code’ filter to select the offences of interest. The following is a list of offences that fall within the Vagrancy Act 1824:
To isolate data for a specific region, use the ‘Police force area’ filter to do the following:
We are unable to isolate individuals prosecuted in the Oxford West and Abingdon constituency as the Courts Proceedings Database uses the location of the court at which a case was dealt as a proxy for location. The nearest court to this constituency is Oxfordshire Magistrates’ Court, which has a broad catchment area including other surrounding constituencies. We are therefore unable to disaggregate individuals from Oxford West and Abingdon constituency from those from other surrounding constituencies.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the number of employers that have been prosecuted for breaches of health and safety in relation to covid-19 to date.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
National statistics on detailed offence level prosecutions including those relating to COVID-19 for the calendar year of 2020 are due for publication in May 2021.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 25 June 2020 to Question 60666 on Renewable energy, what plans his Department has to install more solar panels and wind turbines on its buildings in the next five years.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The Government is committed to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050. This includes taking action to increase the use of renewable energy across the Government estate. Where this relates to solar panels and wind turbines on buildings occupied by Ministry of Justice, active consideration will be given to installation.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many of his Department's documents have been lost since 2017; and how many of those documents were deemed sensitive.
Answered by Alex Chalk
Information relating to departments reported lost are collated on a financial year basis rather than a calendar year. As you have requested for information since 2017, I am providing information beginning from the reporting year 2016/2017.
Reporting of information relates to documents containing personal data rather than all documents. The department captures personal data loss incidents, these are broken down into the following categories:
We do not capture the loss of documents according to the classification levels so these incidents include both official and sensitive data.
Throughout this period the department has taken significant action to increase both awareness and reporting. This has led to an increase of both suspected and actual data breaches which is reflected in these figures.
This information is already made publicly available through the department’s annual report, this also includes details of where the Information Commissioner's Office has been notified due to the incident. These reports are available for 2016/17, 2017/18, 2018/19. The annual report for 2019/20 is set for publication later this year.
I have provided a copy of these reports for reference below.
2018/19
2017/18
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ministry-of-justice-annual-report-and-accounts-2017-18
2016/17
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many of the backlogged cases in the Criminal Justice System are for (a) murder, (b) rape and (c) robbery in 2020.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The table below provides the information requested on the number of outstanding cases in the Criminal Justice System for (a) murder, (b) rape, and (c) robbery in 2020.
National statistics on the level of outstanding work in the criminal courts for the first quarter of 2020 were published on 26 June 2020. These data represent a proportion of the total outstanding caseload.
Outstanding cases in the Magistrates’ and Crown Court as at 31 March 2020 | |||
| Murder | Robbery | Rape |
Magistrates’ Court1 | 76 | 654 | 1911 |
Crown Court | 354 | 1,770 | 1,159 |
1Notes
Source HMCTS management information |
Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that the data have been extracted from large administrative data systems generated by the courts. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when data are used. |
The figure for outstanding cases in the Magistrates Court is based on all cases with a Case Opened date prior to 31 March 2020 and no Case Completion date, irrespective of when the offence was committed. |
Data are taken from a live management information system and can change over time. |
The data provided is the most recent available and for that reason might differ slightly from any previously published information. |
Data are management information and are not subject to the same level of checks as official statistics. |
Data has not been cross referenced with case files. |
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many and what proportion of prisoners on short-term sentences re-offended after being released from prison in each year since 2015.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Please see the link below that details how many and what proportion of prisoners re-offended after being released from prison, ordered by sentence length. The figures for adult offenders can be found in table C2a and the figures for juvenile offenders can be found in table C2b. The latest data available goes up to March 2018.
Reforms we have recently announced to probation will tackle reoffending by delivering more investment in skilled probation staff and ensuring stronger, service user informed support and supervision for offenders.