Asked by: Lord Benyon (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what strategic priorities her Department has given to the National Wildlife Crime Unit in each of the last five years; and on what key areas her Department has instructed that unit to focus until 2016.
Answered by Norman Baker
The Home Office recognises the importance of wildlife crime, and is providing specific funding of £136,000 for the National Wildlife Crime Unit in each of the next two financial years.
The Home Office does not set specific priorities for the National Wildlife Crime Unit, other than to tackle wildlife crime. The Unit produces a tactical assessment of wildlife crime across the UK every six months. This assessment is then considered by the UK Tasking and Co-ordinating Group, which includes the Home Office and Defra.
Asked by: Lord Benyon (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Declaration of the London Conference on the Illegal Wildlife Trade, what consideration her Department has given to ensuring that wildlife crime offences are made recordable offences.
Answered by Norman Baker
Offences relating to the illegal purchase and sale of the world's most highly endangered species are already included in the Home Office Counting Rules for police recorded crime, with the specific crime recording code of 99/3. This includes the illegal trade in iconic species such as elephants, rhinoceroses and tigers, which provided the focus to the London Conference on the Illegal Wildlife Trade.