Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to improve neighbourhood policing.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Neighbourhood policing sits at the heart of the British policing model. It is a critical building block in helping communities feel safe.
That is why we are introducing the Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee, restoring patrols to town centres and recruiting thousands of extra police officers, PCSOs and Special Constables, and we will set out further details in due course.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, on what grounds the asylum seeker sent to Rwanda on 30 April 2024 had claimed asylum.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson
Individuals who have no right to remain in the UK legally are being offered voluntary relocation to Rwanda under a new agreement with the Government of Rwanda. This will relocate individuals who have no right to work, rent or remain in the UK to relocate to Rwanda and allow them to build safe and prosperous lives there.
Individuals will receive £3,000 to support their relocation, paid to them on a card that can only be used in Rwanda.
This builds on our already widely used voluntary returns scheme, which saw more than 19,000 people return to their country-of-origin last year. We can also now facilitate relocation to Rwanda, providing an alternative for those whose country of origin is unsafe or those who would prefer not to return, but have no right to remain in the UK.
Under this Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Rwanda, individuals relocated voluntarily will have the same package of support for up to five years and access to integration programmes, so that they can study, undertake training, and work. Actual spend of the policy will be reported as part of the annual Home Office Reports and Accounts in the usual way.
It would not be appropriate to provide individual details of voluntary relocations that the Home Office has helped facilitate.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much was spent on sending an asylum seeker to Rwanda on 30 April 2024.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson
Individuals who have no right to remain in the UK legally are being offered voluntary relocation to Rwanda under a new agreement with the Government of Rwanda. This will relocate individuals who have no right to work, rent or remain in the UK to relocate to Rwanda and allow them to build safe and prosperous lives there.
Individuals will receive £3,000 to support their relocation, paid to them on a card that can only be used in Rwanda.
This builds on our already widely used voluntary returns scheme, which saw more than 19,000 people return to their country-of-origin last year. We can also now facilitate relocation to Rwanda, providing an alternative for those whose country of origin is unsafe or those who would prefer not to return, but have no right to remain in the UK.
Under this Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Rwanda, individuals relocated voluntarily will have the same package of support for up to five years and access to integration programmes, so that they can study, undertake training, and work. Actual spend of the policy will be reported as part of the annual Home Office Reports and Accounts in the usual way.
It would not be appropriate to provide individual details of voluntary relocations that the Home Office has helped facilitate.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what airline took an asylum seeker to Rwanda on 30 April 2024.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson
Individuals who have no right to remain in the UK legally are being offered voluntary relocation to Rwanda under a new agreement with the Government of Rwanda. This will relocate individuals who have no right to work, rent or remain in the UK to relocate to Rwanda and allow them to build safe and prosperous lives there.
Individuals will receive £3,000 to support their relocation, paid to them on a card that can only be used in Rwanda.
This builds on our already widely used voluntary returns scheme, which saw more than 19,000 people return to their country-of-origin last year. We can also now facilitate relocation to Rwanda, providing an alternative for those whose country of origin is unsafe or those who would prefer not to return, but have no right to remain in the UK.
Under this Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Rwanda, individuals relocated voluntarily will have the same package of support for up to five years and access to integration programmes, so that they can study, undertake training, and work. Actual spend of the policy will be reported as part of the annual Home Office Reports and Accounts in the usual way.
It would not be appropriate to provide individual details of voluntary relocations that the Home Office has helped facilitate.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the prevalence of abuse of people of restricted growth.
Answered by Laura Farris
We have a robust legislative framework to respond to all forms of hate crime, including those which target a person’s disability.
Whilst the police are operationally independent and work in line with the College of Policing’s operational guidance to respond to hate crime, we expect them to fully investigate these offences and work with the Crown Prosecution Service to ensure perpetrators are brought to justice.
The Government is pleased to see the overall reduction in police-recorded hate crime in the year ending March 2023, including a 1% reduction in disability hate crime compared with the previous year. However, any instance is one too many and we remain absolutely committed to ensuring these offences are stamped out.
A person of restricted growth is not necessarily a disabled person. A disability hate crime is any criminal offence which is perceived by the victim or any other person to be motivated by a hostility or prejudice based on a person’s disability or perceived disability, or any disability including physical disability, learning disability and mental health or developmental disorders. This will be a question of fact in each case.
Our absolute priority is to get more police onto our streets, cut crime, protect the public and bring more criminals to justice. We are supporting the police by providing them with the resources they need. We delivered our commitment to recruit an additional 20,000 officers by March 2023 and there are now over 149,000 officers in England and Wales, which is higher than the previous peak in March 2010 before the Police Uplift Programme.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment he has made of the impact of the proposed changes to the minimum salary threshold for spousal visas on individuals already living in the UK on such a visa.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
Analytical work has been undertaken across Government to support decision making in this process, and an Impact Assessment will be developed in due course.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate he has made of the number of people who will be unable to renew their visas under the proposed changes to the minimum salary threshold in (a) Tooting constituency and (b) the UK.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
Analytical work has been undertaken across Government to support decision making in this process, and an Impact Assessment will be developed in due course.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many couples on a spousal visa with a combined income of over £38,700 but individual incomes of under £38,700 will be affected by the proposed changes to the minimum salary threshold.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
Analytical work has been undertaken across Government to support decision making in this process, and an Impact Assessment will be developed in due course.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate he has made of the number of visa applications that would have been refused under the proposed changes to the minimum salary threshold between 2016 and 2022.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
Analytical work has been undertaken across Government to support decision making in this process, and an Impact Assessment will be developed in due course.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) police officers and (b) police community support officers there were in (i) Balham ward, (ii) Trinity ward, (iii) Tooting Bec ward, (iv) Tooting Broadway ward, (v) Furzedown ward, (vi) Wandsworth Common ward, (vii) Wandle ward, (viii) South Balham ward and (ix) Wandsworth Town ward in the London Borough of Wandsworth in 2022.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The Home Office collects and publishes data on the size of the police workforce in England and Wales, broken down by Police Force Area (PFA), on a bi-annual basis in the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin.
These data are collected by PFA only, and lower levels of geography, such as London Boroughs are not collected. Data on the number of police officers and Police Community Support Officers in the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) as at 31 March and 30 September each year, on a full-time equivalent (FTE) and headcount basis, accessed here: Police workforce England and Wales statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
While the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin remains the key measure of the size of the police workforce, as part of the Police Officer Uplift Programme, the Home Office publishes a quarterly update on the number of police officers (headcount terms only) in England and Wales, also broken down by PFA. They can be accessed here: Police Officer uplift statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
The latest data from the ‘Police Officer Uplift’ statistics shows, as at 31 March 2023, across England and Wales, there are 149,572 police officers, the highest number of police officers on record, surpassing the previous peak in March 2010 by 3,542 officers.