Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of exemption to the rules preventing anyone previously sentenced to more than 12 months in custody from obtaining visas for performing artists who have had clean records for the past 10 years.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Immigration Rules in this area are aligned with the long-standing automatic deportation threshold for individuals who have received a custodial sentence of 12 months or more, as set out in the UK Borders Act 2007. In exceptional circumstances, a visa may be granted, but that has not been a common practice since the passage of the 2007 Act.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a statutory duty on fire and rescue services in England to respond to major flooding events.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Defra is the Lead Government Department for Flooding and are responsible for response and prevention of flooding.
Fire & Rescue Services, with continued support from the Home Office, remain ready to respond to flooding. The Home Office supports FRAs in responding to flood incidents by providing national resilience High Volume Pump (HVP) capability comprising 45 HVPs. These are available to be used by Fire & Rescue Services across the country during major flood incidents.
Fire and Rescue Authorities have duties under the Civil Contingencies Act (2004) to prepare for emergencies, including major flooding. Fire Rescue Authorities also have discretionary powers to respond to incidents under their general powers in the Fire and Rescue Services Act (2004) and in response to the risks set out in their Community Risk Management Plans prepared under the National Framework.
The Home Office is undertaking further work alongside Defra, National Fire Chiefs Council and other relevant stakeholders to understand in more detail if there are gaps in the Fire and Rescue Services flooding response and resilience system.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the capacity of fire and rescue services in England to respond to flooding.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Defra is the Lead Government Department for Flooding and are responsible for response and prevention of flooding.
Fire & Rescue Services, with continued support from the Home Office, remain ready to respond to flooding. The Home Office supports FRAs in responding to flood incidents by providing national resilience High Volume Pump (HVP) capability comprising 45 HVPs. These are available to be used by Fire & Rescue Services across the country during major flood incidents.
Fire and Rescue Authorities have duties under the Civil Contingencies Act (2004) to prepare for emergencies, including major flooding. Fire Rescue Authorities also have discretionary powers to respond to incidents under their general powers in the Fire and Rescue Services Act (2004) and in response to the risks set out in their Community Risk Management Plans prepared under the National Framework.
The Home Office is undertaking further work alongside Defra, National Fire Chiefs Council and other relevant stakeholders to understand in more detail if there are gaps in the Fire and Rescue Services flooding response and resilience system.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what her planned timetable is for the introduction of Respect Orders.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Tackling anti-social behaviour is a top priority for this Government, and a key part of our Safer Streets Mission.
This is why we are introducing Respect Orders – tough behavioural orders, issued by the civil courts – to tackle the most persistent adult ASB offenders and ensure that our communities are free from harm.
The Respect Order will be introduced in the first session Crime and Policing Bill.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will publish a breakdown of criminal offenders who were ordered to be deported at the end of their prison sentence by (a) shortest prison sentence imposed, (b) average prison sentence imposed, (c) longest prison sentence imposed and (d) criminal offence convicted in each of the last six years.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes data on returns of foreign national offenders (FNOs) in the ‘Immigration System Statistics Quarterly Release’. Data on quarterly numbers of returns of FNOs are published in table Ret_02a of the ‘returns summary tables’. Information on how to use the dataset can be found in the ‘Notes’ page of the workbook. The latest data reports up to the year ending June 2024.
Deportations are a specific subset of returns which are enforced either following a criminal conviction or when it is judged that a person’s removal from the UK is conducive to the public good. The deportation order prohibits the person returning to the UK until such time as it may be revoked.
Information about sentence length and offence type are not currently included in our published statistics and could only be obtained for the purposes of this question at a disproportionate cost. Official statistics published by the Home Office are kept under review in line with the code of practice for statistics, taking into account a number of factors including user needs, the resources required to compile the statistics, as well as quality and availability of data. These reviews allow us to balance the production of our regular statistics whilst developing new statistics for future release.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of individual appeals to (a) introducing and (b) executing deportation orders on people convicted of criminal offences.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
In most deportation cases, there is no right of appeal unless the person concerned makes a human rights or protection claim, in which case there is a right of appeal against a decision to refuse the claim.
Where a person who has permission to stay in the UK under the EU Settlement Scheme is threatened with deportation, there is a right of appeal against the decision to make a deportation order against them, in compliance with the Agreement on the Withdrawal of the UK from the EU.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many offenders who have been ordered to be deported following their prison sentence remain in the country by (a) offence and (b) country of birth.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
We are committed to delivering justice for victims and safer streets for our communities.
Any foreign national offender (FNO) convicted of a crime who receives a custodial sentence in the UK is referred to the Home Office for deportation consideration following sentencing. We are focusing resources on those cases currently serving custodial sentences directly from prison.
The latest statistics on FNO removals and on FNOs subject to deportation action are available here: Immigration Enforcement data: Q2 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
We will pursue deportation action against individuals living in the community rigorously, actively monitoring and managing cases through the legal process and negotiating barriers to removal.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many foreign nationals have been issued with deportation orders but not deported.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
The information requested is not available from published statistics.
The Home Office publishes a quarterly paper on statistics on foreign national offenders (FNOs) subject to deportation action, living in the community. These are published in the Immigration Enforcement Data, Year Ending June 2024, which are available at: Immigration Enforcement data: Q2 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Any FNO convicted of a crime who receives a custodial sentence in the UK is referred to the Home Office for deportation consideration following sentencing. We are focusing resources on those cases currently serving custodial sentences and maximising removals directly from prison.
We will pursue deportation action against individuals living in the community rigorously, actively monitoring and managing cases through the legal process and negotiating barriers to removal.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many offenders were (a) ordered to be deported at the end of their prison sentence and (b) deported at the end of that sentence in each of the last six years.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)
We are committed to delivering justice for victims and safer streets for our communities. Foreign nationals who commit crime should be in no doubt that the law will be enforced and, where appropriate, we will pursue their deportation, and they will be swiftly removed from the country.
The Home Office publishes the quarterly statistics on the returns of foreign national offenders (FNOs) by nationality and year. These returns are published in the Returns Detailed Datasets, Year Ending June 2024, which are available at: Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The published statistics refer to enforced returns which include deportations, as well as cases where a person has breached UK immigration laws, and those removed under other administrative and illegal entry powers that have declined to leave voluntarily.
Figures on deportations, which are a subset of enforced returns, are not separately available.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to help ensure the financial sustainability of Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Standalone Fire and Rescue Authorities will see an increase in core spending power of £95.4 million in 2024/25. This is an increase of 5.6% in cash terms compared to 2023/24.
In 2024/25 Shropshire FRA has a core spending power of £28.8m, an increase of £1.6m (6.0%) compared to 2023/24.
As at 31 March 2023 Shropshire FRA held £6.0m in resource reserves. This is equivalent to 22.1% of their 2023/24 core spending power and an increase of £1.1m (22.4%) compared to the previous year.
In addition to the funding received through the Local Government Finance Settlement, fire and rescue authorities including Shropshire FRA will receive a share of grants provided by the Home Office, including Pensions and Protection grants.
The Government will continue to work closely with stakeholders across the sector to ensure fire and rescue services have the resources they need to keep the public safe.