Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the timeframe is for the National County Lines Co-ordination Centre to be operational; and how many (a) officers and (b) staff he plans to be employed at the centre when it is fully operational.

The National County Lines Co-ordination Centre has been established jointly by the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead and the National Crime Agency to significantly enhance the response to county lines. A hub within the National Crime Agency has been active since early this year, and the Centre itself became fully operational on 21 September. It has around 40 personnel of which half are police officers.