§ Ms AbbottTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how much Government funding, broken down by local authority area, is given to community groups working to combat gun crime. [149787]
§ Caroline FlintIn the current financial year, the Government are providing £1.5 million from recovered criminal assets specifically to support community action to help tackle gun crime and gun culture. £300,000 of this has been allocated to Disarm Trust, an independent organisation that raises money and provides support for community groups working to reduce gun crime, supports victims of gun crime and provides help for witnesses. The remainder is being distributed by eight of the Government Offices for the Regions to support community action. The funding is not broken down by local authority areas. The allocations to the eight Government Offices are set out as follows.
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Government Office £ London 400,000 West Midlands 200,000 South West 75,000 Yorkshire and Humberside 75,000 South East 100,000 North West 200,000 East Midlands 75,000 East of England 75,000 In addition, we are providing funding for community-based programmes to tackle gun crime through the Street Crime Initiative in a number of areas. This money is in addition to other funding provided through the Government Offices, for example, to support regeneration and to tackle deprivation and social exclusion, which help to address the factors that can give rise to criminality, including gun crime.