HC Deb 24 April 1995 vol 258 cc384-5W
Mr. David Shaw

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list for each agency and central Department for which he is responsible(a) the total hours of overtime worked for which payment has been made, (b) the total amount paid in overtime and (c) the total time in days and its monetary equivalent lost through sickness in each of the last three years. [19683]

Mr. Howard

The available information on overtime, taken from the Home Office pay computer, is as follows:

of taking into account individual defendants' past behaviour on sentencing policy. [18748]

Mr. Maclean

A special exercise was undertaken to monitor the effects of the Criminal Justice Acts 1991 and 1993. It found that there was a rise in the proportionate use of custody for adult males at both magistrates and Crown courts—most noticeably for property offences—following the implementation of the provisions of the 1993 Act which, among other things, restored to courts their power to take account of the previous convictions of offenders and their responses to previous sentences. This rise was most significant for offenders sentenced for property offences who had between six and 20 previous convictions. The rise effectively restored the proportionate use of custody for these offenders to the level evident prior to the implementation of the 1991 Act. The exercise also suggested that for adult males sentenced at the Crown court there appeared to have been an increase in the length of sentences given to those sentenced for all types of offences where they had between six and 20 previous convictions.1

A comparison of the sentencing of a sample of offenders with and without previous convictions in 1991 taken from the offenders index is included in "Criminal Statistics England and Wales 1993". Information about offenders convicted in 1993 will be available later this year. 1Home Office Statistical Bulletin Issue 20/94 "Monitoring of the Criminal Justice Acts 1991 and 1993—Results from a Special Data Collection Exercise".