Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to ensure the timely processing of domestic abuse cases in courts; and what additional resources have been allocated to minimise case backlogs.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Whilst judges already prioritise cases involving vulnerable victims and witnesses, including domestic abuse, we know that victims who cases are heard at the Crown Court are waiting too long for justice.
That is why this Government commissioned Sir Brian Leveson’s Independent Review of the Criminal Courts. After considering the recommendations made in Part 1 of this report, we have announced our intention to take forward a bold package of structural reforms, designed to improve timeliness in the Crown Court and speed up justice for all victims, including victims of domestic abuse. This financial year we also funded 111,250 Crown Court sitting days – an all-time high.
We have also published our Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy - ‘Freedom from Violence and Abuse’ - setting out the Government’s approach to tackling domestic abuse and other offences perpetrated against women and girls. We are already acting by:
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times drones have been recorded delivering (a) weapons and (b) drugs into prisons in each of the last three years.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
We publish the number of drone incidents in England and Wales in the HMPPS Annual Digest, please see table 6_1 in the Finds tables. The latest issue covers the 12-month period to March 2025, with a time series of drone incidents starting from the 12-months to March 2021.
Any increase in reported drone incidents should not be interpreted as an increase in incursions; it may reflect more focused reporting. Drone incidents should not be interpreted as definitive evidence of the delivery of weapons and drugs into prisons, as they include all incidents where a drone is sighted. Data specific to deliveries of illicit items cannot be disclosed for security reasons.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what discussions her Department has had with the devolved Administrations on support for victims of (a) stalking and (b) coercive control.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
This Department regularly engages with the devolved administrations regarding support for victims.
Section 16 of the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 applies to England and to reserved matters in Wales. It is important that victims can expect as consistent support as possible in both nations and when engaging with agencies across the border. Ministry of Justice officials have worked with relevant officials in the Welsh Government in developing the guidance on the Independent Domestic Violence Adviser and Independent Sexual Violence Adviser roles published in May 2025. We will continue to engage with them on the Independent Stalking Advocate guidance which we will publish next year.
Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) in Wales receive funding from the Ministry of Justice to commission local practical, emotional, and therapeutic support services in their areas for victims of all crime types including stalking and coercive control. Additional ringfenced funding is also provided for domestic abuse and sexual violence support services. The Department routinely engages with Welsh PCCs to monitor and understand the commissioning landscape.
The Inter-Ministerial Group for Justice (IMGJ) is a forum for ministers from all four UK governments to discuss priority justice matters and exchange best practice approaches. We anticipate that victims’ issues will be discussed at future IMGJ meetings.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to (a) increase prosecution rates for online child sexual exploitation offences and (b) support victims throughout the legal process.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Government continues work to deliver meaningful change for victims of child sexual abuse and exploitation. I refer the Hon Member to the Minister for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girl's statement made to Parliament on 08 April 2025, which provided an update on the Government's work to tackle child sexual abuse and exploitation and respond to the recommendations of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse. The full statement can be found here: Hansard
Under the Victims’ Code, all victims including children and young people, are entitled to be given information about their case and be referred to victim support services by the police to help them cope and recover. Police and Crime Commissioners in England and Wales also receive annual grant funding from the Ministry of Justice’s victim and witness budget to commission support services for victims of all crime types and all ages. This includes funding for Independent Sexual Violence Advisors who play an important role in supporting victims of sexual abuse and exploitation, including children and young people, through the criminal justice process.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to help prevent reoffending by people convicted of violent offences.
Answered by Edward Argar
This Government is committed to tackling the causes of reoffending to keep our communities safe. Between 2010/11 and 2020/21, the overall proven reoffending rate has decreased from 31.6% to 24.4%.
Rehabilitation is critical to reducing reoffending. It is the process by which we assist people either to change themselves or improve their life circumstances, addressing their drivers of reoffending and therefore cutting crime. Rehabilitation takes many forms, ranging from the delivery of a cognitive behaviour programme to enabling a person to access suitable accommodation and the means to earn a living.
HMPPS offers 5 Accredited Programmes specifically designed for those individuals convicted of general, domestic, intimate partner violent offending: Kaizen, Becoming New Me Plus (BNM+), Building Better Relationships (BBR), New Me Strengths (NMS), and Living as New Me (LNM). The Thinking Skills Programme (TSP) is a responsive and flexible Accredited Programme that may be suitable for those offenders who do not meet the eligibility criteria for more specific programmes, as well as the New Me MOT toolkit, offering continuity of support to those who have completed the Kaizen, BNM+, or NMS programmes.
In addition to our targeted work to prevent violent crime reoffending, we are also working hard to ensure that prison leavers across the estate have the right building blocks in place to ensure they are successful on release. For example, we are helping prison leavers to secure accommodation, employment, and substance misuse treatment, all of which are essential for rehabilitation and can significantly reduce the likelihood of reoffending. We are also delivering Commissioned Rehabilitative Services which provide offenders with tailored, community-based services to support rehabilitation and drive down reoffending. On top of this, we are expanding the use of electronic monitoring for both community-based sentences and post-custody licence to help reduce the risk of reoffending and support robust offender management.
Finally, public protection work is central to the work of the Probation Service. We have also increased our baseline funding by £155 million per annum which is helping us to increase staffing and take other action to improve delivery across HMPPS so that the service can best achieve its purpose of protecting the public and reducing reoffending.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what data his Department holds on the ethnicity of offenders convicted of theft in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Mike Freer
The Ministry of Justice holds data on the ethnicity of offenders convicted of theft offences covering the period requested and these are published and can be viewed in Outcomes by Offence tool: June 2023.
The tool allows users to select offences (in this case Offence ’04: Theft offences’). Yearly totals can be broken down by quarter using the Quarter variable.
The ethnicity of the offenders can be found by using either the Ethnicity or Detailed Ethnicity filter. Furthermore, the number of convictions by ethnicity can be seen by dragging the Ethnicity or Detailed Ethnicity from Filters to Rows in the PivotTable Fields.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether he has had discussions with the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists on its guidance to healthcare professionals relating to the reporting of suspected illegal abortions.
Answered by Laura Farris
The Ministry of Justice is responsible for the criminal law relating to abortion. However, the overall policy on abortion is the responsibility of the Department for Health and Social Care. Therefore, the Secretary of State for Justice has not had discussions with the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists on its guidance for healthcare staff on “Involvement of the police and external agencies following abortion, pregnancy loss and unexpected delivery”.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of introducing a new offence for (a) encouraging or (b) assisting serious self-harm in the new online safety regime.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Shadow Secretary of State for Defence
The Law Commission, in its report “Modernising Communication Offences”, recommended the creation of a specific offence of encouraging or assisting a person to self-harm. The Government is currently considering that recommendation and the details of such a new offence.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times the Computer Misuse Act 1990 has been used successfully to prosecute offences or attacks against computer systems that involve (a) ransomware (b) malware and (c) phishing in each of the last five years.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The number of prosecutions and convictions for offences which take place online is not centrally held in the court proceedings database as this type of offence is not separately identified in legislation. Equally, offences involving ransomware, malware and phishing are not separately identified in legislation. Identifying these offences separately would require a manual search of court records, which would be at disproportionate costs.
Published figures provide the number of prosecutions and convictions for the following offence that may include offences which occurred online:
Computer Misuse Act 1990
The number of prosecutions and convictions can be found by searching the above offences in the ‘Detailed offence’ filter in the ‘Principal offence proceedings and outcomes by Home Office offence code’ data tool available here:
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times the Computer Misuse Act 1990 has been successfully used to prosecute cyber crime in each of the last five years.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The number of prosecutions and convictions for offences which take place online is not centrally held in the court proceedings database as this type of offence is not separately identified in legislation. Equally, offences involving ransomware, malware and phishing are not separately identified in legislation. Identifying these offences separately would require a manual search of court records, which would be at disproportionate costs.
Published figures provide the number of prosecutions and convictions for the following offence that may include offences which occurred online:
Computer Misuse Act 1990
The number of prosecutions and convictions can be found by searching the above offences in the ‘Detailed offence’ filter in the ‘Principal offence proceedings and outcomes by Home Office offence code’ data tool available here: