Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking the help reduce the number of drug offences in (a) East Devon constituency and (b) Devon.

Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary

Reducing drug-related crime is a key priority of the Government’s 10-year Drugs Strategy. We are making good progress. Since April 2022, we have closed over 2,500 county lines nationally.

Through the County Lines Programme, our exporter force taskforces (Metropolitain Police Service, Merseyside, West Midlands and Greater Manchester Police) work in collaboration with importer forces, including Devon & Cornwall Police, to tackle the drug supply and exploitation associated with County Lines.

Through our County Lines Programme, we also fund the National County Lines Co-ordination Centre (NCLCC), to monitor the intelligence picture and co-ordinate the national law enforcement response. We have also established a dedicated Surge Fund to help forces tackle county lines, from which Devon and Cornwall Police have received investment.

Through the Drugs Strategy, we are also investing £532m into high quality drug treatment which reduces crime and reoffending. There are now 24,500 more people in treatment across England, including Devon.

The Government has asked every area in England to form a Combating Drugs Partnership (CDP) to work together to reduce drug-related harm and crime. East Devon is covered by the Devon CDP. The Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Devon and Cornwall has established a Strategic Peninsular Drugs & Alcohol Partnership which meets 4 times a year and serves as a forum for the 4 CDPs (including Devon CDP) to come together at a Police Force Area level.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking to help tackle anti-social behaviour in (a) East Devon constituency and (b) Devon.

Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary

Last year the Government launched the Anti-social Behaviour Action Plan (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/anti-social-behaviour-action-plan), backed by £160m in new funding to ensure the police, local authorities and other relevant agencies have the tools they need to tackle anti-social behaviour.

This includes funding an increased police and other uniformed presence to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, targeting hotspots. Initially we worked with 10 police force areas and following its success in 2024 we are supporting a hotspot approach across every police force area in England and Wales. Devon and Cornwall PCC has been awarded £1m in funding to carry out the Hotspot Response approach, tackling areas of high incidents of both ASB and serious violence.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make an assessment of the implications for his policies of trends in the level of crime in (a) East Devon constituency and (b) Devon.

Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary

Across the country, communities are safer and the Government’s plan to cut crime and protect the public is working. Compared with 2010, people are now 60% less likely to have their home burgled and around 40% less likely to be victims of violent crime.

We are supporting Devon and Cornwall to reduce crime:

• During the Police Uplift Programme, Devon and Cornwall Police recruited 600 additional uplift officers against a total three-year allocation of 469 officers. As at 30 September 2023, there were 3,716 police officers in Devon and Cornwall, representing the highest number ever when compared to their pre-Police Uplift peak of 3,632 officers as at March 2010.
• Devon and Cornwall’s police funding settlement will be up to £429.4m in 2024/25, an increase of up to £29.1m when compared to 2023/24.
• Devon and Cornwall have been allocated £657,000 in FY 24/25 to deliver the Serious Violence Duty. The Serious Violence Duty requires a range of specified authorities to work collaboratively and put in place plans to prevent and reduce serious violence within their local communities.
• Devon and Cornwall have received £1m for Hotspot Response in FY 24/25 to tackle areas with high incidents of both anti-social behaviour and serious violence.

We continue to monitor all these measures to ensure they are having the impact on crime we all want to see.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking to help tackle violence against women and girls in East Devon constituency.

Answered by Laura Farris

It is difficult to determine the specific activity to tackle violence against women in the East Devon constituency as services are mostly commissioned at a national level, and not monitored by the Home Office by constituency.

To help support local service commissioners, we published a revised National Statement of Expectations in March 2022, which sets out how local areas should commission effective services. It also aims to increase understanding of the need for specialist services and the value of those designed and delivered by and for the users and communities they aim to serve.

As part of the effort to tackle these crimes across England and Wales, in 2021 we published our cross-Government Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy to help ensure that women and girls are safe everywhere - at home, online, at work and in public. This was followed by a complementary cross-Government Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan in 2022.

These documents aim to transform the whole of society’s response to these crimes with actions to prevent abuse, support victims and pursue perpetrators, as well as to strengthen the systems that underpin the response. The actions set out in both strategy documents benefit all regions across England and Wales, including East Devon.

The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan committed to over £230 million from 2022-2025. As part of this commitment, the joint Home Office-Ministry of Justice VAWG Support and Specialist Service Fund will provide up to £8.3 million (in total) from 2023-2025 for specialist organisations to support victims often facing the greatest barriers to getting the help they need.

The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan funding also includes the Children Affected by Domestic Abuse (CADA) Fund, which allocated £10.3 million over three years (2022-2025) to eight organisations across England and Wales to provide specialist support within the community to children who have been impacted by domestic abuse. Part of this includes c.£1.25m for the Children’s Society to provide direct support for children and young people and families, including those from rural and hard to reach communities, covering Devon, Shropshire, Rochdale and Merseyside.

In May 2023, the Home Office also launched a £300,000 ‘flexible fund’ trial in partnership with Women’s Aid Federation for England to make direct cash payments of £250 to victims and survivors of domestic abuse (£500 to those with children and those who are pregnant) to help remove barriers to leaving an abusive relationship. In November 2023, the Government commitment to support victims was renewed with a further £2m investment into the Flexible Fund until March 2025.

Through the current Round Five of the Safer Streets Fund, the Home Office has directly awarded £34 million to Police and Crime Commissioners across England and Wales to deliver interventions to tackle neighbourhood crime, anti-social behaviour and VAWG. Devon and Cornwall received £819,998.64 (2024-2025) to support projects covering Paignton, Camborne and Redruth and are delivering educational training packages such as bystander training to help address behaviour and attitudes on VAWG and using night-time economy marshalls for patrols in the town centres.

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The Culture, Media and Sport Committee is to continue work from the last Parliament examining the challenges faced by the British film and high-end television industry and how the sector and its workforce can be better supported.

The Culture, Media and Sport Committee is to hold a short inquiry into the BBC World Service.