Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to help Police and Crime Commissioners tackle (a) rural crime and (b) agricultural theft.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
This Government is committed to reducing crime and disorder in rural areas, given the devastating impact rural crime can have on communities. Under our reforms, rural communities will be safeguarded, with tougher measures to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, strengthened neighbourhood policing and stronger measures to prevent farm theft and fly-tipping.
We are also committed to implementing the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act 2023, which aims to prevent the theft and re-sale of high-value equipment, particularly for use in an agricultural setting.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of the sufficiency of funding to the National Police Air Service.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
The National Police Air Service (NPAS) provides borderless, round-the-clock, crewed police air support across England and Wales.
The Home Office supports NPAS through the provision of an annual capital grant. For the Financial Year 2024/25, this grant is £11.46m. The NPAS revenue budget is funded through contributions from police forces. For Financial Year 2024/25 this budget is £49.6m.
Funding for future financial years will be agreed as part of the ongoing Spending Review.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether additional funding will be provided to Police and Crime Commissioners (a) to deliver above-inflation pay rises and (b) long term.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
Police officer pay is determined by the Home Secretary, following advice from the independent Police Remuneration Review Body and Senior Salaries Review Body. On 29 July, the Government announced it had accepted the Review Bodies’ recommendations to award all ranks and pay points a consolidated increase of 4.75% with effect from 1 September 2024.
To support forces with the cost of the pay award, the Home Office is providing additional funding of £175m in 2024/25. Funding for 2025/26 will be announced in the next Spending Review.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to (a) increase prosecution rates for perpetrators of rural crime and (b) protect victims of those crimes.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government recognises the importance of tackling rural crime. We are committed to safeguarding rural communities, with tougher measures to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, strengthened neighbourhood policing, and stronger laws to prevent farm theft and fly-tippers.
We are also committed to implementing the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act 2023, which aims to prevent the theft and re-sale of high-value equipment, particularly for use in rural settings.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council Wildlife and Rural Crime Strategy 2022-2025 provides a framework through which policing, and its partners, can work together to tackle the most prevalent threats and emerging issues which predominantly affect rural communities.
The Home Office funded the establishment of the National Rural Crime Unit. The unit takes the lead on improving co-ordination and partnership working between police forces and rural communities. This provides police forces with specialist operational support in their responses to rural crime, such as the theft of farming or construction machinery, livestock theft, fly tipping, fuel theft and equine crime. The unit also helps in sharing best practice and encouraging regional and national approaches.
The Home Office also directly funds the National Wildlife Crime Unit to provide intelligence, analysis and investigative assistance to forces and other law enforcement agencies across the UK to support them in investigating wildlife crime, which can affect rural areas.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to help tackle (a) the theft of high value agricultural machinery and (b) other rural crime.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government recognises the importance of tackling rural crime. We are committed to safeguarding rural communities, with tougher measures to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, strengthened neighbourhood policing, and stronger laws to prevent farm theft and fly-tippers.
We are also committed to implementing the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act 2023, which aims to prevent the theft and re-sale of high-value equipment, particularly for use in an agricultural setting.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council Wildlife and Rural Crime Strategy 2022-2025 provides a framework through which policing, and its partners can work together to tackle the most prevalent threats and emerging issues which predominantly affect rural communities.
The National Rural Crime Unit, which the Home Office funded the establishment of, takes the lead on improving co-ordination and partnership working, which provides police forces with specialist operational support in their responses to rural crime, such as the theft of farming or construction machinery, livestock theft, fly tipping, fuel theft and equine crime, as well as through sharing best practice and encouraging regional and national approaches.
The Home Office also directly funds the National Wildlife Crime Unit to provide intelligence, analysis and investigative assistance to forces and other law enforcement agencies across the UK to support them in investigating wildlife crime, which can affect rural areas.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many youth hubs South Shropshire constituency will receive from the plan to establish a new network of youth hubs.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government is committed to intervening early to stop young people being drawn into crime with an ambition to half knife crime in a decade, accompanied by a new, increased focus on crime prevention.
Fundamental to this will be the delivery of our Youth Futures programme, which will include the rollout of youth hubs across England and Wales. We want to work with the police, partners and local communities to design and deliver these hubs. That will include decisions on the exact location of hubs to ensure they are in the local areas that will benefit most.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps his Department is taking to (a) provide support for groups for victims of domestic abuse and (b) increase the availability of those groups.
Answered by Amanda Solloway
Tackling domestic abuse and ensuring victims receive the support they need is a priority for this Government. Our landmark Domestic Abuse Act 2021 will strengthen our protection to victims and ensure perpetrators feel the full force of the law. It includes the first legal definition of domestic abuse, improved support for victims in the courts, new offences, including on non-fatal strangulation, and strengthened legislation around cruel acts of controlling or coercive behaviour.
The Act also places a duty on local authorities in England to provide support to victims of domestic abuse and their children in refuges and other safe accommodation, backed by £125 million of Government funding to ensure that these vital services are available to anyone who needs them, wherever they live. This will be supported by a new £6 million Domestic Abuse Capacity Building Fund to help Local Authorities prepare for the upcoming duty.
In March 2022, we published the Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan which will seek to transform the whole of society’s response in order to prevent offending, support victims and pursue perpetrators, as well as to strengthen the systems processes in place needed to deliver these goals.
The Plan invests over £230 million into tackling domestic abuse. This includes over £140 million to support victims, much of which is multi-year funding, part over £47 million of which is ringfenced for community-based support services.
As committed to in the cross-Government Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy published on 21 July last year, the Home Office has also provided an additional £1.5 million funding this year for ‘by and for’ service provision and to further increase funding for valuable specialist services for victims of violence against women and girls.
The Home Office is also planning to double funding for survivors of sexual violence and the National Domestic Abuse Helpline by 2024-25, and further increase funding for all the national helplines it supports.
The VAWG National Statement of Expectations, and Commissioning Toolkit, which we have published alongside the Plan, will also provide support to commissioners to help them increase provision of ‘by and for’ and specialist services.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2014 at tackling anti-social behaviour.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
It is important that local authorities have the powers they need to tackle all local issues quickly and effectively. That is why we introduced a range of flexible tools and powers to tackle anti-social behaviour through the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014.
The powers in the 2014 Act are deliberately local in nature and it is for local authorities to determine how best to respond to each individual case. The powers support appropriate action to resolve anti-social behaviour, including through setting restrictions or positive requirements on individuals.
The Home Office published statutory guidance to support local areas to make effective use of these powers to emphasise the importance of focusing on the impact of anti-social behaviour on victims and further to support local authorities to make effective use of these powers. This guidance was updated in June 2022 to ensure a victim-centered approach to tackling ASB.
Last year the Beating Crime Plan laid out the Government’s plan for tackling crime and ASB and committed to working with local agencies and partners to drive down ASB using the full range of powers and tools in the 2014 Act.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps her Department has taken to ensure all enquiries to UK Visa and Immigration are actioned and dealt with in a timely manner.
Answered by Kevin Foster
For all visa application queries the public should call the Home Office customer helpline. The Home Office service standard is to answer 80% of calls within 30seconds.
Last week we answered 77% within 30 seconds with an average wait time of 1 minutes 9 seconds.
We continue to work with our service provider to regularly review their performance to ensure service standards are maintained. We are working with our service provider to increase the number of staff operating the customer helpline. It is envisaged this will enable the service standard to be met in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to (a) support groups for victims of domestic abuse and (b) increase the availability of such groups.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.