Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the effectiveness of (a) Operation Scorpion and (b) other initiatives in reducing drug trafficking and county lines activity in Devon and Cornwall.

Through the County Lines Programme, we will continue to target exploitative drug dealing gangs and break the organised crime groups behind the trade. To deliver our pledge to halve knife crime in the next decade it is crucial that we tackle the drug gangs that run county lines through violence and exploitation.

Between July and September 2024, policing activity delivered through the County Lines Programme has resulted in over 400 deal lines being closed, the arrest and charge of over 200 deal line holders, 500 arrests and 800 safeguarding referrals of children and vulnerable people. Through the Programme, we also fund specialist support for children and young people caught up in county lines and child criminal exploitation. More than 280 children and young people have received dedicated specialist support through our county lines support service since July 2024.

While the majority of lines originate from the areas covered by the Metropolitan Police Service, West Midlands Police, Merseyside Police, and Greater Manchester Police, county lines is a national issue. This is why, through the Home Office-funded County Lines Programme, we fund the National County Lines Co-ordination Centre to monitor the intelligence picture, identify and share effective practice, and co-ordinate the national law enforcement response. In addition, we have a dedicated surge fund which provides local forces with additional funding to tackle county lines. This funding has previously been used to support Op Scorpion, the joint South West regional operation to tackle drug supply, which has yielded significant results.

As part of the Programme, the NCLCC regularly coordinates weeks of intensive action against county lines gangs, which all police forces take part in. During the most recent which took place 25 November to 1 December 2024, activity from Op Scorpion resulted in 95 individuals being arrested, and 107 individuals being safeguarded. Devon & Cornwall Police made 26 arrests, safeguarded 49 vulnerable individuals, visited 28 cuckooed addresses, and seized Class A drugs with an estimated value of £175k.

As committed to in the Government’s manifesto, we are introducing a new offence of child criminal exploitation in the Crime and Policing Bill to go after the gangs who are luring children into violence and crime. Alongside an offence, we are introducing new civil preventative orders to prevent CCE conduct from occurring or re-occurring. We are also introducing an offence of cuckooing to target individuals who take over the homes of vulnerable people for criminal purposes and punish them for the harm caused.