Question to the Attorney General:

To ask the Solicitor General, how many prosecutions were brought against the biological parents of children in foster care for incidents involving (a) inappropriate, (b) threatening and (c) abusive contact with their child’s foster parents since May 2024.

Threatening or abusive behaviour can amount to an offence under the Public Order Act 1986. To establish whether defendants charged with Public Order Act offences committed these offences against the foster carers of their children would require a manual review of case files and this would be at disproportionate cost.

Management information is held showing the number of offences charged by way of Section 4 (fear or provocation of violence), Section 4A (intentional harassment, alarm or distress) and Section 5 (harassment, alarm or distress) in which a prosecution commenced during the period from 1st May 2024 to 31st December 2024. The table below shows the number of these offences during that period.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) does not hold any data which shows the number of defendants prosecuted and convicted for offences created by the Public Order Act 1986.

The figures relate to the number of offences and not the number of individual defendants. It can be the case that an individual defendant is charged with more than one offence against the same complainant. No data is held showing the final outcome or if the charged offence was the substantive charge at finalisation.

There is no offence of inappropriate behaviour.