Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much his Department (a) paid in apprenticeship levy fees and (b) spent from its apprenticeship levy funds between September 2021 and August 2023.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Department has contributed £22,753,441.56 in Levy funds between September 2021 and August 2023.
During the same period, the Department has spent £12,609,530.86.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what (a) schemes and (b) grants their Department administers that are open for (i) individuals, (ii) organisations and (iii) other groups in Feltham and Heston constituency to apply for as of 10 January 2024.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
There are no schemes or grants identified as open to apply for as of 10 January 2024 in Feltham and Heston constituency.
All opportunities are advertised on Find a Grant.
The following link provides information about the status of current and future procurement opportunities with the Ministry of Justice: Ministry of Justice Commercial Pipeline - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an estimate of the number of duty solicitors in (a) Feltham and Heston constituency, (b) West London and (c) Greater London.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Legal Aid Agency (LAA) is responsible for commissioning duty solicitor services and the day-to-day administration of the court and police station duty schemes. This includes keeping membership records, allocating slots and producing and maintaining duty solicitor rotas. The LAA monitors membership across individual duty schemes. Information about duty solicitor volumes broken down by individual scheme is published as part of the LAA’s quarterly statistics.
Legal Aid services are not procured at constituency level, however, the duty schemes falling with the Feltham and Heston constituency include Brentford, Ealing and Uxbridge, Heathrow, Richmond-Upon Thames and West London.
At a national level, the LAA monitors capacity across criminal legal aid contracts on an ongoing basis and, where demand is greater than the available supply, takes action to secure additional provision to ensure the continuity of legal aid-funded services.
The LAA is satisfied that there continues to be sufficient duty solicitor coverage on the duty schemes operating in Feltham and Heston, West London and Greater London. Provision under the duty schemes is demand led and so there may be variations in numbers across each local rota or other fluctuations in numbers depending on prevailing market conditions, and other internal factors such as firms merging or other consolidation activity.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will publish a Green Paper on potential alternatives to the current model of unlocking child trust funds for disabled young people.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
A consultation seeking views on proposals for accessing limited funds belonging to an individual who lacks mental capacity, which included Child Trust Funds, was published by the Ministry of Justice in November 2021. The response to the consultation was published in February 2023: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/mental-capacity-act-small-payments-scheme. Copies are available in the House library.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many Personal Independence Payment claims are awaiting a hearing attached to each of the First-tier Tribunal (Social Security and Child Support) regional offices.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Information about appeals to the First-tier Tribunal (Social Security and Child Support) (SSCS) is published at: www.gov.uk/government/collections/tribunals-statistics.
As at end of December 2022 (the latest period for which data are available), the number of Personal Independence Payment appeals awaiting a hearing for each of the SSCS Regional Processing Centres are shown below:
| Personal Independence Payment appeals1 | ||
Processing Centre | No. Ready to List | No. Listed for Hearing | Total Outstanding |
Birmingham | 4,160 | 1,566 | 7,519 |
Bradford | 3,289 | 775 | 5,159 |
Cardiff | 2,438 | 1,336 | 6,128 |
Glasgow | 1,578 | 426 | 2,675 |
Leeds | 2,283 | 1,530 | 5,151 |
Liverpool | 3,570 | 394 | 5,414 |
Sutton | 2,062 | 959 | 4,347 |
Unallocated 2 | 8 | 1 | 23 |
Total | 19,388 | 6,987 | 36,407 |
1. Personal Independence Payment (New Claim Appeals) which replaces Disability Living Allowance was introduced on 8 April 2013, also includes Personal Independence Clams (Reassessments)
2. Unallocated relates to appeals that have not yet been allocated to a Processing Centre.
Management information reflects the data held on the case management system, which is subject to change, and can differ from the quality-assured MOJ official statistics, which form the agreed definitive position.
Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that the data have been extracted from large administrative data systems. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when data are used.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the proportion of invoices his Department paid to small and medium-sized enterprises within five days in (a) the 2021-2022 financial year and (b) each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
All government departments publish payment performance quarterly, showing the percentage of invoices paid in 5 days; the percentage of invoices paid in 30 days; and net debt interest liability. The Ministry of Justice pays 85% of submitted invoices within 5 days, and 96% of submitted invoices within 30 days.
Ministry of Justice’s payment performance is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice/about/procurement#prompt-payment-of-our-suppliers.
In addition, in accordance with 113 of the Public Contract Regulations 2015, Contracting Authorities are required to publish annually the percentage of invoices paid in 30 days online. This is also available within the above link.
The Procurement Bill, currently passing through Parliament, will create a simpler and more transparent procurement regime that will further open up public procurement to SMEs. The Bill includes a new duty on contracting authorities to have regard to the particular barriers facing SMEs. Specifically, the Procurement Bill will imply 30 day payment terms into every sub-contract that is substantially for the purpose of performing a public contract. This will ensure SMEs at every tier of the public supply chain can benefit from faster payments, even if 30 day terms aren't explicitly written into the contract.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people have been convicted of a criminal offence under section 31 of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 in each of the last 12 years.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The number of defendants convicted of an offence under section 31 of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 in each of the last 12 years, on a principal offence basis, has been provided in Table 1.
There were also 2 cases in which the defendant was committed for trial at Crown Court for an offence under section 31 of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998, one in the year ending June 2016 and one in the year ending June 2019. Due to data issues, the outcome of those two cases is unknown.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent steps he has taken to progress the implementation of his Department's action plan entitled A response to: An inspection of accommodation and support for adult offenders in the community and on release from prison, published in July 2021.
Answered by Rob Butler
Since the publication of the action plan, HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has committed to increase capacity across the Approved Premises estate by 200 beds. To date, we have delivered more than 152 beds with the full expansion on track to be delivered by March 2024. Additionally, our new Community Accommodation Service Tier 2 (CAS-2), (formerly known as Bail Accommodation and Support Services), will increase spaces by a further 300 beds over the next 3 years.
The Community Accommodation Service Tier 3 (CAS3) offers temporary accommodation for up to 84 nights to prison leavers who would otherwise be homeless. It can be used as ‘move on’ provision from Approved Premises as well as for prison leavers at risk of homelessness.
HMPPS has also retained the Homeless Prevention Teams as a permanent feature to develop relationships with local authorities and other strategic partners in order to embed and expand housing options for prison leavers.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many young people aged eighteen or younger have undertaken work experience in his Department in the last 12 months; and what proportion of those young people were (a) girls and (b) boys from state schools.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Ministry of Justice’s Social Mobility Programme provides work experience placements for students aged under 18 from less privileged backgrounds, targeting state schools that have more than 20% of students receiving free school meals. Under the programme, the Ministry of Justice also provides a number of placements for students over 18 from less privileged backgrounds.
MoJ has provided a total of 1,297 placements since 2017; gender information was not collected prior to 2021.
Social Mobility Programme - Calendar year Sep 21 – Aug 22
Placement 01 September 2021 – 31 August 2022 | 138 |
18 and under | 83 |
Over 18 | 40 |
No data | 15 |
| Total | Percentage |
Female | 85 | 62% |
Male | 25 | 18% |
Identify in another way | 2 | 1% |
No data | 26 | 19% |
Additionally, the Department delivers a number of Civil Service internship schemes and participation rates for the schemes have been provided for 2021 and 2022 intakes below. These schemes are for individuals over the age of 18:
Internship | 2021 intake | 2022 intake |
Summer Diversity Internship Programme (SDIP) & SDiP for Digital, Data and Technology (SDIP DDaT) | 51 | 19 (14 SDiP, 5 SDiP DDaT) |
Early Diversity Internship Programme | N/A | 19 |
DfE Care Leavers | 10 | 3 (1 awaiting vetting) |
Launch (MoJ Care Leavers) | N/A | N/A (numbers available in November) |
Movement to Work | 10 | 0 |
To ascertain whether the Department (including all 34 agencies and public bodies) has provided work experience placements for students aged 18 or younger in the last 12 months, in addition to the MoJ Social Mobility Programme and Internship Schemes, will exceed the proscribed costs limit.
Asked by: Seema Malhotra (Labour (Co-op) - Feltham and Heston)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many young offenders received (a) no visitors, (b) one visitor and (c) more than one visitor a month in each young offender institution in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Wendy Morton
This information is not held centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
Governors and Directors of contracted prisons are required to actively encourage young people in custody to maintain outside contacts and meaningful family ties, which is integral to the children’s’ right to family life as well as their rehabilitation. Visits are also vital in sustaining their relationships with close relatives and friends, where appropriate, while helping to maintain community ties.