Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to ensure that sex offenders are monitored and that their whereabouts is always known.

Anyone convicted of a relevant offence automatically becomes subject to the sex
offender notification requirements to manage the risk they pose. Such offenders
are monitored and managed by the police under the Multi-Agency Public
Protection Arrangements (MAPPA). Monitoring the whereabouts of these
individuals is an operational matter for the police and a range of checks and
legislative measures, including civil preventative orders, are available so the
police know where these offenders are and can manage them effectively.

We work closely with the police to continually monitor the system of
notification requirements and civil orders in order to ensure officers have the
powers they need to protect the public.

This Government has strengthened the system for monitoring sex offenders. In
2012, we extended the notification requirements, and on 8 March 2015, we
replaced the previous powers used by police to protect the public from sexual
harm with two new orders: the sexual harm prevention order and the sexual risk
order. The grounds upon which these orders can be made are now wider, and for
the sexual harm prevention order, the threshold applied to protect people from
harm has been lowered. The available prohibitions which can be attached to both
orders are also wider, allowing for foreign travel restrictions to be imposed.
In addition, for the first time, both orders can be applied for by the National
Crime Agency, as well as the police.