Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many recipients of Tier 1 (Investor) visas were flagged as potentially at high risk of having links to corruption or organised crime in the recent Tier 1 (Investor) visa review.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Tier 1 (Investor) route has been closed. The then Home Secretary made a Written Ministerial Statement on 12 January 2023 setting out the findings of a review into issuance of visas under the route between 2008 and 2015. The Government will not be commenting further on the findings of that review.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many asylum-seekers have been relocated to Rwanda to date; and what payments they have made to the government of Rwanda to accept asylum-seekers from the UK.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
There have not been any relocation flights operated from the UK to Rwanda to date due to ongoing legal challenges.
The UK has provided Rwanda with an initial investment of £120m as part of the Migration and Economic Development Partnership.
The UK has also made a £20m upfront payment to the Government of Rwanda to support initial set up costs.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many criminal conduct authorisations for (1) state, and (2) non-state, personnel have been made under the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Act 2021.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The data is not held in the requested format.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the letters from the Chair of the House of Commons Treasury Committee to the Financial Conduct Authority and the National Economic Crime Centre on 15 October 2020, how many banks have been (1) investigated, and (2) prosecuted, for forging customer signatures.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The National Crime Agency has reviewed the material from the Bank Signature Forgery Campaign and is notifying relevant parties of their findings.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what amount of funding, if any, police forces have received from banks in the last 10 years.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Police and Crime Commissioners generate income through a variety of funding sources including Government grants, police precept, charging for policing commercial events and investments (both interest and dividends).
You can find detailed breakdowns of force financing arrangements in their published annual financial statements.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether criminal charges relating to the Grenfell disaster have been brought; and if so, what were the outcomes of those cases.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The ongoing police investigation into the Grenfell Tower fire and any criminal charges relating to the disaster are a matter for the Metropolitan Police Service and the Crown Prosecution Service.
The Metropolitan Police Service has announced that it will wait until the Inquiry has published its final report before deciding what evidence to submit to the Crown Prosecution Service, as they will take into account the evidence from the Inquiry.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to extradite Aflak Ahmad, who registered Aflak Travelling Abroad Ltd at Companies House on 21 December 2020; and whether any action has been taken against the provider of their London office address.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The decision to seek a person’s extradition is one taken by the UK’s prosecuting authorities and law enforcement agencies. As a long-standing matter of policy, we will neither confirm nor deny that an extradition request had been made until such time as an arrest had been made.
I can however confirm that Companies House has (as of 8 March) commenced action to strike the company from the register of companies. A notice has been published in the London Gazette.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many Unexplained Wealth Orders have been issued against a Javier Clemente Engonga Avomo who, according to Companies House records, is director of The United States of America Corporation Ltd, The United States of Africa Corporation Ltd and World Corporate Organization Ltd, which have authorised share capitals of £1.8 trillion, £500 billion and £900 billion respectively.
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 comment on individual cases.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Williams of Trafford on 20 December 2021 (HL4745), whether they have monitored the progress made by the National Economic Crime Centre and the Financial Conduct Authority in their investigation of allegations of forgeries of customer signatures by banks.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Treasury ministers and officials engage with a number of organisations and stakeholders on a variety of policy issues.
The Government expects all companies to obey the law and relevant regulations. Anyone with evidence of forgery taking place should report it to their bank in the first instance. If their concerns remain, or they do not have a direct relationship with the lender, they should report it to the relevant authorities.
The National Crime Agency (NCA), supported by the FCA, is continuing to assess the material submitted by the Bank Signature Forgery Campaign and information obtained following preliminary enquiries to clarify matters with certain members of the public who had raised the issue. They are also making a thorough assessment to determine whether there are grounds for a criminal or regulatory investigation.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when the National Crime Agency and the Financial Conduct Authority received the first complaints alleging that banks had forged customer signatures to repossess homes, businesses and other property.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The Government expects all companies to obey the law and relevant regulations. Anyone with evidence of such forgery taking place should report it to their bank in the first instance. If their concerns remain, or they do not have a direct relationship with the lender, they should report it to the relevant authorities.
Although the Treasury sets the legal framework for the regulation of financial services it does not have investigative or prosecuting powers of its own and is not able to intervene in individual cases. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) requires all authorised firms to have systems and controls in place to mitigate the risk that they be used to commit financial crime. Whilst the police have primary responsibility for investigating fraud the FCA also has powers to take a variety of enforcement action against firms that carry out fraudulent activity.
The chair of the Treasury Select Committee wrote to NCA Director General Lynne Owens on the issue of bank signature forgery in July 2019. The matter was assigned to the National Economic Crime Centre for consideration in September 2019.