Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what evidence they have about whether French border patrol ships are systematically monitoring or shadowing migrant boats across the English Channel into UK waters; and what that evidence shows, if anything, about the outcome when such boats reach the English coast.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Border Force vessels covering the South East Channel are usually tasked to identify migrant events by the Coastguard, with the priority being search and rescue and the safety of life. Border Force work closely with the Coastguard and French authorities to ensure we provide an effective response to migrant events at sea. Migrants undertaking these dangerous journeys in unsuitable and overloaded small boats are putting the lives of themselves and others at considerable risk and the priority for all assets deployed at sea is safety.
At sea, under international law, the preservation of life is paramount. In some cases, French boats will remain with migrants if they refuse rescue. But we are clear no-one should be crossing at all and we are developing plans to reform policies and laws to help to stop these crossings completely.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many illegal migrants coming to the UK via France were apprehended by UK authorities (1) since the COVID-19 lock-down began, and (2) in each month since May 2018; and what percentage of those apprehended in each of those months have been successfully repatriated.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
We do not routinely publish the information you have requested, we are unable to provide this information, as it could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
The number of migrants arriving in the UK crossing the Channel by small boats for the months of January to March 2020 is approx. 450.? These are provisional figures based on operational management information. The figures for April and May have not passed through a data quality check and cannot be assured. The final figures for all months will be published at a later date, once they have been verified and fully quality assured.
The UK continues to work closely with France and other countries to return migrants who have entered the UK by small boat in order to provide a strong deterrent against these dangerous crossings.
Since January 2019, over 155 people who entered the UK illegally on small boats have been returned to Europe. However, as a result of COVID-19 the vast majority of EU member states have temporarily paused accepting returns under the Dublin Regulations, but we are tracking those individuals and where appropriate will seek to return them when routes are available
It is the policy of this Government to return those not in need of protection.
The majority of countries who are signatories to the?Dublin?Regulations which governs the return of those seeking asylum in the UK to a third country have announced temporary suspension of transfers to and from all EU Member States due to the Corona virus.
Returns?to third-countries can still take place where there is a suitable route of return.
We are ready to resume?Dublin?returns?as soon as travel restrictions are lifted
The Home Office publishes data on the number of asylum seekers transferred under the Dublin regulation in the ‘Immigration Statistics Quarterly Release’ (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/immigration-statistics-quarterly-release). Data on the number of asylum seekers transferred out of the UK under the Dublin Regulation, broken down by the EU member state they have been transferred to are published in tables Dub_D01 of the asylum and resettlement detailed datasets (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets). Information on how to use the dataset can be found in the ‘Notes’ page of the workbook. The latest data relates to the year ending December 2019.
Please note, that we do not publish the breakdowns of the nationality of those being transferred under the Dublin regulation.
Additionally, the Home Office publishes a high-level overview of the data in the ‘summary tables’ (attached). The ‘contents’ sheet contains an overview of all available data on asylum and resettlement.
Information on future Home Office statistical release dates can be found in the ‘Research and statistics calendar’ (https://www.gov.uk/search/research-and-statistics?keywords=immigration&content_store_document_type=upcoming_statistics&organisations%5B%5D=home-office&order=relevance).
Full guidance on Dublin III Regulation was published on 30/04/2020 and can be found via the link below:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/882400/Dublin-III-regulation-v3.0ext.pdf
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) whether France has taken effective action to apprehend those who accommodate illegal migration to the UK, and (2) how many arrests and convictions of such people traffickers have been recorded and reported by France over the past two years.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The Home Office liaises directly with the French Interior Ministry on addressing the issue of illegal migration, engaging at an official, diplomatic level and supported at an operational level through regular UK-French Migration Committees.
Through joint-working with France, the UK has funded the continued deployment of French law enforcement along the coast of northern France, who are patrolling constantly in order to detect attempted crossings by migrants. Funding has been allocated, among other projects, for further security improvements at ports in northern France and on the ground, which includes drones, specialist vehicles and detection equipment to stop small boats leaving European shores.
Intelligence flows are also key to dismantling the organised crime groups behind crossings. We have restructured and repurposed our approach to support to better inform and direct how and where law enforcement is deployed.
We do not hold data on French arrests and convictions.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what financial payments the UK has made to France to assist in the prevention of illegal migration in each of the last five financial years.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The UK and France maintain a longstanding relationship on tackling illegal migration at the shared border; since 2015 the UK has committed several funding packages to supporting this work. In 2015, both countries signed a Joint Declaration which committed £10 million towards security reviews of the juxtaposed controls and to moving migrants into reception centres across France. This was followed by payments in 2016 (£17 million) and 2017 (£36 million) to further strengthen the border and maintain the operation of the juxtaposed controls.
In January 2018 both countries signed the Sandhurst Treaty. The UK made a commitment of €50 million (£45.5m) to implement the terms of the Treaty, which adopted a “whole of route approach” to tackling illegal migration. This was followed in 2019 by the signature of the Joint Action Plan on Combatting Illegal Migration Involving Small Boats. Under paragraph 11 of this plan, the UK committed €3.6m (approximately £3.25m) to tackling the issue. This was supplemented with a further €2.5m (£2.25m) in the 19/20 Financial Year, which was dedicated to the deployment of gendarme reservists and further strengthening preventive security measures at the French coast.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answers by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth on 3 July 2017 (HL3), 15 September 2017 (HL1448), and 13 October 2017 (HL1671), and by Lord Duncan of Springbank on 21 December 2017 (HL3975), 16 March 2018 (HL6045), 20 November 2018 (HL11393 and HL11394), and 17 May (HL15556), what has been the total number of criminal charges for electoral abuse in (1) Northern Ireland, and (2) elsewhere in the UK, since 2010.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The Home Office holds data for the outcomes of crimes recorded by police forces in England and Wales.
Since 2010 there have been 231 known recorded charges for the Home Office criminal offence codes which cover crimes related to electoral abuse.
This does not include offences of tampering with nomination or ballot papers which cannot be separately identified in the data held centrally.
As policing is a devolved matter, data for Scotland and Northern Ireland are not held by the Home Office.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many hacking offences pertaining to customers’ bank accounts have been resolved in each of the past three financial years; in how many cases hackers were convicted; and what proportion they estimate the sum attributed to those offences resulting in conviction is of the total estimated to have been stolen through such hacking offences in the last three financial years.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The UK Government does not hold data on customer losses from hacking against banks.
There were 142 convictions for Computer Misuse Act offences between 2015-2017. It is not possible to identify from centrally held data the number of hacking offences specifically relating to customer bank accounts. We are unable to disaggregate offences relating specifically to bank accounts from those offences under the Computer Misuse Act 1990.
The cyber threats we face continue to grow in scale and sophistication. This is why the National Cyber Security Strategy 2016-2021 is supported by £1.9billion of transformational investment.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the authority of Nottinghamshire Police to categorise wolf-whistling as a hate crime rather than a public nuisance; and whether they consider that such a decision may derogate from the seriousness of classification of hate crime.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The five strands of monitored hate crime (race, religion, sexual orientation transgender identity and disability) are the minimum categories that police officers and staff are ex-pected to record. There are, however, many other groups in society who have been targeted with hostility and crime. Any specific incidents of Hate Crime are an operational matter for the police.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the decision by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission to refuse the Home Office the right to deport six individuals, allegedly linked to al-Qaeda, to Algeria; and what is their current assessment of the total cost implications of complying with that ruling without further appeal.
Answered by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government is disappointed by the 18 April 2016 decision of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission which relates to cases dating back over ten years.
There are no separately identifiable costs for complying with that ruling.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what, if any, extra security measures are being implemented, and at what cost, following the decision by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission to refuse the Home Office the right to deport six individuals, allegedly linked to al-Qaeda, to Algeria.
Answered by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
We do not comment on security matters. However national security remains our primary consideration and we have taken, and will continue to take, all necessary measures to protect our national security.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the implications of the Islamic doctrine of hijrah for the United Kingdom and Europe in the context of increased migration from the Middle East and North Africa; and whether in the light of that assessment increased resources are being given to police and security agencies within the United Kingdom to manage any potential threat.
Answered by Lord Bates
We work closely with our European partners to assess the threat we face from terrorism and to respond appropriately. This includes ensuring that appropriate screening processes are in place where necessary with regard to individuals entering and exiting our borders.
A Written Ministerial Statement in December 2013 confirmed that the police counter terrorism resource budget would be at least £564 million for 2014-15. A further Written Ministerial Statement in December 2014 confirmed at least the same amount would be available for 2015-16. In addition, HM Treasury has increased funding in 2015-16 for counter terrorism policing by a further £14.9 million to strengthen our capabilities in response to the increased threat from terrorism.
In the Summer Budget this year, the Chancellor announced that counter terrorism spending will be protected in real terms for the 2016/17 - 2020/21 Spending Review period. This demonstrates the Government’s commitment to providing the resources needed to tackle threats from terrorism.