Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the backlog is for enhanced DBS checks by police area.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) operates to service standards of completing 80% of Enhanced check applications within 14 days. These service standards can be seen in quarterly performance reporting which the DBS publishes at: DBS dataset 1: DBS checks, the DBS Update Service, and disputes - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
The latest published statistics are for September 2023 which show that the DBS is completing 78.1% of Enhanced check applications within 14 days. The DBS does not publish data by police area.
An Enhanced check requires the DBS to send applications to the police for local data searches and local intelligence checks. Currently some police forces’ turnaround times have been affected by increased volumes of disclosure applications against original forecasts.
Police forces are recruiting more staff to service the additional demand for Enhanced DBS checks The DBS is working collaboratively with policing partners to enhance the quality of an enhanced criminal record check referral to improve turnaround times and continues to modernise its services through the replacement of legacy systems and further digitisation of disclosure products.
Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the implementation of the Public Order Act 2023, what support her Department is providing to local councils that are managing protestors outside facilities providing abortion care.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
It is completely unacceptable that anyone should feel harassed or intimidated when trying to access, provide or facilitate abortion services.
The Police and Local Authorities already have powers to restrict harmful protests and prevent antisocial behaviour.
The Public Order Act 2023 received Royal Assent on 2 May. The timescales for commencing the new Section 9 offence of interference with access to, or provision of, abortion services will be confirmed in due course.
Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many incidents of (a) fraud and (b) robbery of tourists on the west side of Westminster Bridge there have been in the latest period for which data is available; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The information is not held in the requested format.
Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether there were earned regularisation processing of distinct groups of undocumented people in each of the last five years; and what assessment her Department has made of the trends in the numbers of asylum applications in following years.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Immigration Rules provide routes for someone who does not have leave in the United Kingdom to apply for leave to remain and regularise their stay.
Under the Family and Human Rights route a person and their dependents if appropriate can apply to remain on the basis their Article 8 Human Rights would be breached if they were required to leave the UK.
The statistics for people applying to stay in the UK permanently can be found at Immigration Statistics Quarterly Release, please note that these statistics are taken from a live database and are subject to change.
The statistics for the numbers claiming asylum can be found at asylum detailed datasets
Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will provide by 2 February 2022 the information asked for by Clive Stafford-Smith on the cases of Muriel McKay and Krishna Maharaj.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The files in question are not owned by the Home Office, and so the department is not in a position to make decisions as to access. Officials are exploring this further with a view to directing the family to the appropriate body if possible.
Any authority in receipt of such a request for information will consider the request on its merits, according to their standard procedures, as the Home Office has.
Asked by: Peter Bottomley (Conservative - Worthing West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she plans to provide to Rupert Burgess the documents he discussed with her.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The files in question are not owned by the Home Office, and so the department is not in a position to make decisions as to access. Officials are exploring this further with a view to directing the family to the appropriate body if possible.
Any authority in receipt of such a request for information will consider the request on its merits, according to their standard procedures, as the Home Office has.