HC Deb 24 January 2000 vol 343 cc17-8W
Mr. Miller

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prosecutions, and how many(a) injuries and (b) deaths there were in each category of road traffic offence, in each of the last five years for which statistics are available. [105850]

Mr. Charles Clarke

The information requested is available only for those offences where death or injury are explicit in the wording of the charge and are shown in the table. Similar information for other offences is not available centrally as the circumstances of the offences are not collected.

Prosecutions for motoring offences involving eath or injury, England and Wales, 1993–97
Offence 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997
Causing death by dangerous driving 352 301 305 333 376
Causing death by careless driving under the influence of drink or drugs 63 48 51 63 78
Causing death by aggravated vehicle taking 27 26 13 27 28
Causing bodily harm by furious driving 98 122 97 99 85

Figures for 1998 are not yet available.

Mr. Miller

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department in how many cases relating to death on the road the charge was reduced from dangerous to careless driving in each of the last five years for which statistics are available. [105849]

Mr. Charles Clarke

The information requested is not available centrally.

lengths stay at 1998 levels. A higher variant assumes that from 2001, in addition to the custody rate increase assumed in the middle variant, sentence lengths increase by 1.5 per cent. per year for males and 2 per cent. per annum for females. The results are as given in the table. These scenarios both assume that the amount of courts' business remains constant over the period. Projections take into account known legislative and policy changes.

Information on the projected number of persons committed to custody for cannabis and class A drug offences are not available. Projections are not made by type of offence.

For persons housed in hospital wings, it is estimated that over the period of the projections between 1.5 and 1.7 per cent. of the prison population will be located in health care centres at any one time.

The statistics collected on court proceedings record only the offence for which the court took its final decision and not that for which the defendant was initially prosecuted, if different.