Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many times police officers requested permission for squad cars to pursue a moped in (a) 2015 and (b) 2016; and on how many occasions such permission was denied by senior police officers.

The Home Office does not collect data on the number of times police officers have requested permission to pursue mopeds, nor on the outcome of any such requests.

Decisions on how to enforce road traffic offences, including on when to initiate a pursuit, are operational matters for the police, taking into account each particular set of circumstances. Any general policy within a force is a matter for the force’s Chief Officer, who will decide how to deploy available resources in dealing with all the issues for which the force is responsible, taking into account any specific local problems and demands.