Asked by: Ashley Fox (Conservative - Bridgwater)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, pursuant to the Answer of 25 October 2024 to Question 9603 on Attorney General: Buildings, how many civil servants are assigned to work in her Department's headquarters in London; and how many individual desks are available in the headquarters office.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
The Attorney General’s Office is based in only one location in London, at 102 Petty France. I refer the Hon Member to the first line of my response to UIN 9602 tabled on Wednesday 6 November 2024. Please also refer to my response to UIN 9603 tabled on Friday 25 October 2024.
Asked by: Phil Brickell (Labour - Bolton West)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, what progress she has made on plans to create a whistleblowing incentive program within the Serious Fraud Office.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
This Government is committed to cracking down on serious fraud and economic crime.
The Director of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has expressed support for the incentivisation of whistleblowers and the SFO Strategy 2024-29 committed to explore options for achieving this, working with partners in the UK and abroad.
The Government will continue to work with the SFO to understand what reforms could be made to help them deliver their mission as effectively as possible.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, what steps she is taking to help increase prosecution rates for rural crime.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
This Government is committed to working with the police and other partners to address the blight of rural crime – broadly classified as any crime and anti-social behaviour occurring in rural areas. We are introducing tougher measures to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, stronger neighbourhood policing, and robust laws to prevent farm theft and fly-tippers.
We are recruiting 13,000 more neighbourhood police and police community support officers across England and Wales.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council Wildlife and Rural Crime Strategy 2022-2025 provides a framework through which policing, and its partners, can work together to tackle the most prevalent threats and emerging issues which predominantly affect rural communities.
Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) prosecutors work closely with local police officers to tackle farm equipment theft, fly-tipping and other rural crime, and officers from the National Wildlife Crime Unit to tackle wildlife offences.
The CPS provides specialist training to ensure that its prosecutors have the expert knowledge needed to prosecute rural crime.
Each CPS Area also has a crown prosecutor dedicated to act as a Wildlife, Rural and Heritage Crime Coordinator to ensure the specialist knowledge needed to prosecute such offending is readily available.
Asked by: Alex Mayer (Labour - Dunstable and Leighton Buzzard)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, what training her Department provides for prosecutors on links between domestic violence and animal abuse.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
Tackling violence against women and girls is a top priority for this Government and ending the scourge of domestic abuse is a crucial aspect of this.
Prosecutors in the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) must have regard to the Government’s statutory guidance framework for controlling or coercive behaviour (the “Framework”). The Framework is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/controlling-or-coercive-behaviour-statutory-guidance-framework.
CPS guidance on controlling or coercive behaviour in an intimate or family relationship explicitly refers to and expands on this Framework. When considering evidence of coercive or controlling behaviour, the guidance states that relevant behaviour can include “threatening to hurt or physically harming a family pet”. CPS guidance is available here: https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/controlling-or-coercive-behaviour-intimate-or-family-relationship.
CPS prosecutors can access a wide range of domestic abuse learning modules and instructor-led programmes, in which they are prompted to consult the CPS guidance above. Prosecutors also recently completed the roll out of a national course on domestic abuse, which all prosecutors who handle these cases were required to attend.
Asked by: James Wild (Conservative - North West Norfolk)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, with reference to paragraph 7.16 of the Ministerial Code, how many ministers have consulted the law officers on legal proceedings in a personal capacity since 4 July 2024.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
Paragraph 7.16 of the Ministerial Code (3.17 of the Ministerial Code updated on 6 November 2024) obliges Ministers involved in legal proceedings in a personal capacity to consult the Law Officers in good time and before legal proceedings are initiated.
The Law Officers do not disclose whether ministers have consulted them on legal proceedings in a personal capacity.
This is due to the long-standing convention, observed by successive Governments, that the fact of, and substance of advice from, the Law Officers of the Crown is not disclosed outside government. The purpose of this convention is to enable the Government to obtain frank and full legal advice in confidence. This is set out in paragraph 21.27 of Erskine May, is known as the Law Officers’ Convention, and it applies to your question.
Asked by: Ashley Fox (Conservative - Bridgwater)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, how many civil servants are assigned to work in each of her Department's offices; and how many desks are available in each office.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
For the period 2 to 27 September 2024, there were 54 civil servants assigned to work in the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) and 42 desks available.
The AGO superintends the Law Officers’ Departments: Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), Government Legal Department (GLD), HM Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate (HMCPSI), and Serious Fraud Office (SFO). Further information on the Law Officers’ Departments is set out below.
As of 30 September 2024, the CPS had a headcount of 7,286 allocated against 4,347 desks.
The GLD has staff based in five sites across the country: 102 Petty France, London; 1 Ruskin Square, Croydon; 7-8 Wellington Place, Leeds; 2 Rivergate, Bristol; and Three New Bailey, Manchester.
For the period 2 to 27 September 2024, the table below shows a breakdown of the number of civil servants based in GLD offices and the number of desks in each office.
Please note that data for 102 Petty France, London, includes 10 HMCPSI staff, which share this office.
Location | Number of civil servants assigned to work in GLD offices | Number of desks in office |
102 Petty France, London | 1509 | 737 |
1 Ruskin Square, Croydon | 86 | 100 |
7-8 Wellington Place, Leeds | 244 | 100 |
2 Rivergate, Bristol | 106 | 38 |
Three New Bailey, Manchester | 135 | 60 |
HMCPSI also shares office space with the CPS in Foss House, York. For the same period, HMCPSI had 10 civil servants assigned to work in Foss House.
As of 30 September 2024, the SFO had 534 permanent employees and 133 temporary agency workers, a total of 667 people. The total number of desks available is 432.
Asked by: Charlie Dewhirst (Conservative - Bridlington and The Wolds)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, pursuant to the Answer of 14 October 2024 to Question 7035 on Attorney General: Official Cars, whether either of the two vehicles are electric cars.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
For security reasons specific details of allocations including make and model of vehicles are not issued.
The arrangements relating to the usage of vehicles in the Government Car Service are set out in the Civil Service Management Code.
Asked by: Charlie Dewhirst (Conservative - Bridlington and The Wolds)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, pursuant to the Answer of 14 October 2024 to Question 7035 on Attorney General: Official Cars, if she will name which specific senior officials have access to a Government car; and whether these senior officials had access to a Government car before the 2024 general election.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
For security reasons specific details of allocations including make and model of vehicles are not issued.
The arrangements relating to the usage of vehicles in the Government Car Service are set out in the Civil Service Management Code.
Asked by: Ashley Fox (Conservative - Bridgwater)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, how much was spent on (a) new furniture and fittings and (b) other refurbishment of Ministerial offices in her Department since the dissolution of the last Parliament; and on what items this was spent.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
Following the dissolution of the last Parliament on 30 May 2024 and before the General Election on 4 July 2024, and prior to the appointment of the Attorney General and I, officials in the Attorney General’s Office arranged for the two ministerial offices to be modestly refurbished. The refurbishment was completed on 30 June 2024 and the costs are set out below.
| Description | Cost |
| Painting and decorating | £3,510.95 |
| Replacement of carpet tiles | £6,448.51 |
| IT monitor | £151.00 |
Asked by: Andrew Cooper (Labour - Mid Cheshire)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, what steps she is taking to increase the number of prosecutions for domestic violence; and what steps she plans to take with Cabinet colleagues to help ensure that victims of domestic violence receive appropriate support to (a) navigate and (b) have confidence in the criminal justice system.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
Strengthening the criminal justice system response to domestic abuse and increasing victim confidence are crucial to achieving this Government’s ambitious commitment to halve violence against women and girls this decade.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) takes prosecuting domestic abuse very seriously and maintains a steady charge rate of over 75% and a conviction rate of approximately 76%.
Next month, in partnership with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), the CPS will publish a national joint justice plan to transform how cases of domestic abuse are prosecuted and handled. The plan recognises that better communication between the CPS and NPCC improves case outcomes for victims. Additionally, through its Victim Transformation Programme the CPS is improving the service it provides to victims of crime.
The Ministry of Justice provides funding to Police and Crime Commissioners who commission community-based support services for domestic abuse victims and Independent Domestic Violence Advisors. The Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 (Act) aims to improve support for victims of domestic abuse by placing a duty on local commissioners in England to collaborate when commissioning services for victims of domestic abuse. The duty will require commissioners to assess the needs of victims of domestic abuse in their area and produce a joint local commissioning strategy. The Act will also improve awareness of and compliance with the Victims’ Code, which supports victims of crime to understand what they can expect from the criminal justice system and sets out the minimum level of service that victims should receive.
The Home Office will also ensure that there are specialist rape and sexual offences teams in every police force and police officers receive stronger training on racism and violence against women and girls.