§ Mr. StrawTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many prosecutions of adult offenders were started in each of the last five years; [7443]
(2) how many prosecutions of young offenders were started in each of the last five years. [7441]
§ Mr. MacleanThe complexities of the criminal justice system and the constraints on resources in collating and processing data necessarily limit the amount of information collected routinely, and so only the final outcome of proceedings at magistrates' courts is collected centrally.
Information on the number of defendants proceeded against at magistrates courts by age group is published in the Command Paper, "Criminal Statistics England and Wales 1995"—latest available. Table 6.1 refers.
Copies of the publication are available in the Library.