Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the (a) security of and (b) use of by extremist, far-right and extreme-right organisations the platform Telegram.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Government has been clear that tech companies need to work together and act more quickly to remove all forms of terrorist content from their platforms.
We know that terrorists and extremists exploit a wide range of platforms to spread their views and to incite terrorist attacks, from mainstream platforms to secure messaging applications and anonymous forums.
To tackle terrorism online, the Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU), based in the Metropolitan Police, refers illegal terrorist content to companies for removal. Within the Home Office, we work closely with our international partners and engage with industry colleagues to discuss how platforms can best safeguard their users from terrorism, while also encouraging tech companies work together as one coordinated body through the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT), to reduce the availability of terrorist content online.
Details of meetings between Ministers and external bodies and organisations are provided through the usual quarterly returns published by the Cabinet Office.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) staff members and (b) residents living in Home Office supported (i) asylum accommodation and (ii) detention facilities have (A) been tested and (B) tested positive for covid-19 since 1 January 2020.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The health of those in asylum accommodation and immigration removal centres (IRC) is of the utmost importance.
The Accommodation providers recognise the challenge of managing COVID 19 within our accommodation estate and are working closely with Public Health England (PHE) on how their guidance on social distancing and self-isolation is properly applied, while ensuring that people can continue to access essential services.
Any individual who has symptoms is able to be tested for covid 19. We do not currently publish figures in relation to the testing of asylum accommodation staff and our service users for Covid-19.
All immigration removal centres have dedicated health facilities run by doctors and nurses which are managed by the NHS or appropriate providers. The Home Office is working closely with NHS England health and justice teams and regional commissioning teams to support their planning and delivery of healthcare services, including testing, in immigration removal centres during the COVID-19 outbreak.
Provisional management information indicates that as of 21 June, there have been 12 confirmed cases of COVID-19 across our detention supplier, healthcare and escorting staff. All of whom have now recovered. In addition, there have been two confirmed cases of COVID-19 in detained individuals. A third individual was identified but after his release from detention had been agreed. Whilst in the IRC the individual was in isolation. He was released as there was no immediate prospect of removal.
As of 26 June, no other detained individuals have tested positive for COVID-19.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will publish the scientific assessment that informed the decision to (a) introduce formal quarantine measures for the flights from (i) Wuhan, China on (A) 31 January, (B) 2 February and (C) 9 February 2020 and (b) Tokyo, Japan on 22 February, and (b) not to introduce formal quarantine measures for other UK arrivals from 1 January 2020.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Scientific evidence from SAGE will continue to be published by Government Office for Science in due course.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many conviction alerts on foreign nationals have not been sent to police in their home countries in each of the last three years, by country.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
In order to resolve this issue, an ongoing technical response has been put in place. It is not possible to provide a specific figure of the number of notifications per EU Member States until the technical response is complete. Each Member State will be notified with the number of notifications they will receive as they are sent, to enable them to process the data as they see appropriate.
The Home Office is working closely with the national Criminal Records Office (ACRO) to finalise the resolution of this issue as soon as possible.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she plans to proscribe the Order of Nine Angles.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Government does not routinely comment on intelligence matters, including whether an organisation is or is not under consideration for proscription.
The Government keeps the list of proscribed organisations under review.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the activities of Sonnenkrieg Division, System Resistance Network, and National Action since their proscription.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Government does not routinely comment on intelligence matters.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much funding her Department has allocated to improving security at places of worship in the South Wales Police area in the last 12 months.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Places of Worship Protective Security Fund (POW) is a key commitment in the Hate Crime Action Plan published in 2016. The Scheme provides funding to places of worship that have been victims of or are vulnerable to hate crime attacks for physical protective measures such as alarms, fencing and access control. The scheme is currently in its fourth year of funding, and successful applicants for this scheme will be announced in due course. There was only one application from Wales in Year 3. However, the criteria were set across all applications and this application did not meet the minimum requirements to receive funding.
Over the first three years of the scheme we provided £1.5m funding for over 130 grants and have £1.6m committed for this financial year (2019/20). There was not any funding allocated under the POW scheme in the South Wales Police area in year three (2018/19). However, the scheme is open to places of worship across England and Wales, and we will continue to promote the scheme across Wales for future rounds of funding.
Following the attacks in Christchurch, we supported Faith Associates to deliver security training prior to and during Ramadan. They delivered 22 workshops across England and Wales, and distributed advice and guidance to over 2,000 mosques, madrassahs and community centres.
The Jewish Community Protective Security Grant was introduced in 2015 following a series of terrorist attacks against Jews and Jewish locations across Europe. In 2018-19 a grant of £13.4m was provided to fund additional protective security measures, primarily guarding, at Jewish state, free and independent schools, colleges, nurseries and some other Jewish community sites, including synagogues. A grant of £14m is to be provided in 2019-20. We do not keep a breakdown of funding by region.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much her Department spent that was classified as Official Development Assistance in each of the last five years, and what the (a) individual projects or (b) budget headings were for that spending.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Departments Official Development Assistance spend in each of the last two years is published at https://devtracker.dfid.gov.uk/department/HO we have recently updated that to include spend dating back to 2015/2016. It may take until June 12 for the update to be reflected on the website.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to immigration statistics published by her Department on 21 May 2020 showing that in January to March 2020 there were an estimated 23.7 million passenger arrivals at the UK Border (including returning UK residents), how many of those arrivals arrived after (a) 13 March 2020 and (b) 23 March 2020 by (i) method of arrival and (ii) origination of their journey.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
On 28 May 2020, the Home Office published additional statistics relating to Covid-19 and the immigration system here. This contains information on the impact of COVID-19 on passenger arrivals, and includes data on the number of passengers arriving in the UK by air routes only.
The Home Office is due to publish the next quarterly Immigration Statistics on 27 August 2020. Information on future Home Office statistical release dates can be found in the ‘Research and statistics calendar’.
Asked by: Stephen Doughty (Labour (Co-op) - Cardiff South and Penarth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people including crew members arrived at the UK border via (a) general aviation, (b) military airfields and (c) non-control point maritime ports of entry in each week from 1 January 2020 to 18 May 2020.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office does not routinely collect number of Passengers and crew members arriving at the UK Border at this level of detail.
The Immigration Statistics publication on the 21 May included data on total passenger arrivals, up to the end of March 2020. In addition, on 28 May, the Home Office published an ad hoc statistical release ‘Statistics relating to Covid-19 and the immigration system, May 2020’, which provided further information on the number of arrivals to the UK up to the end of April 2020.