§ Mr. MorganTo ask the Attorney-General if he will list the number of prosecutions for fraudulent multiple share applications arising out of each privatisation share issue.
§ The Attorney-GeneralOne hundred and twenty seven prosecutions have been conducted by the fraud investigation group at Crown Prosecution Service headquarters. A very small number of multiple share application cases are likely to have been submitted by the police to local offices of the Crown Prosecution Service but records are not maintained such as would enable these to be readily identified from other cases of deception.
Statistics relating the number of prosecutions broken down according to individual privatisation issues are not routinely maintained by the Crown Prosecution Service, and the information can only be obtained at dispropor-tionate cost.