Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, how many cyclists have been prosecuted under the provisions of Section 35 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 in each year since 2000.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
The safety of our roads is a key priority for this government.
We have amended the Crime and Policing Bill to provide for new offences and penalties for dangerous cycling, updating legislation that is over 160 years old, to ensure that the tiny minority who recklessly disregard others face the full force of the law.
Cases of causing death or serious injury by dangerous or careless driving have usually been prosecuted under section 35 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 (OAPA 1861), but this offence applies to any person ‘having charge of any carriage or other vehicle’ and therefore does not solely apply to cyclists.
The earliest data held by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) for prosecutions of offences under s. 35 OAPA 1861 is from 2005. Between 1 January 2005 and 31 December 2024, the CPS authorised charges for 362 offences of causing injury by wanton and furious driving contrary to s. 35.
Of these charges, the CPS is unable to identify which offences involved defendants who were cyclists, without a manual review of each case, which would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, pursuant to the Answer of 17 March 2025 to Question 36473 on Human Trafficking: Cambridgeshire, how many of the (a) 56 cases flagged for modern slavery and (b) 11 cases with a monitoring flag for child abuse, involved (i) victims and (ii) perpetrators from (A) Guinea-Bissau and (B) Portugal.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has conducted a full manual review of the 11 case files with a monitoring flag for child abuse. It could not ascertain whether the defendants and victims were from Guinea-Bissau or Portugal from the information provided by the police.
The CPS were unable to undertake a full manual review of the remaining cases with a monitoring flag for modern slavery as to obtain this information would incur a disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Solicitor General, how many prosecutions for child-trafficking there have been in Cambridgeshire since 2010.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
This Government is committed to tackling the scourge of child trafficking. Children who are exploited by gangs for criminal purposes will now receive greater protection under the Government’s flagship Crime and Policing Bill, with the introduction of a new offence of child criminal exploitation. The Bill represents the biggest package of measures on crime and policing for decades, with new measures to cut crime and make our streets safer.
From January 2010 to September 2024, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) prosecuted 56 cases flagged for modern slavery in the Cambridge Police Force Area.
Data is recorded by defendant, rather than victim, and therefore modern slavery flagged cases may involve adult or child victims. Of these 56 cases, 11 cases also had a case monitoring flag applied for child abuse, which covers several different offences, including child trafficking.
The CPS is working closely with law enforcement via the Modern Slavery Criminal Justice Action Group – a joint working group led by CPS National Lead for Human Trafficking and the National Police Chiefs’ Council Lead for Modern Slavery and Organised Immigration Crime – to identify areas of improvement to promote early advice and increase referrals and prosecutions of modern slavery cases.