§ Mr. ChopeTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list the number of prosecutions which the Health and Safety Executive has brought against each local authority in England in the last three years; and how many have resulted in convictions. [3252]
§ Angela EagleIn the three years from 1993–94 to 1995–96, the Health and Safety Executive prosecuted local authorities in England 44 times for 51 alleged breaches of health and safety law and secured 50 convictions. Details from HSE records are shown in the table. Figures for the year April 1996-March 1997 are not yet available.
521W
Local authority Occasions prosecuted Breaches alleged Convictions Wealden District Council 1 1 1 East Sussex County Council 1 1 1 London Borough of Islington 1 1 1 St. Edmundsbury Borough Council 1 1 1 Norwich City Council 1 1 1 Stevenage Borough Council 1 1 1 Salford Borough Council 1 1 1 Lancaster City Council 1 1 1 Sunderland City Council 1 1 1 Avon County Council 1 1 1 Somerset County Council 1 1 0 London Borough of Southwark 1 1 1 City of Birmingham 1 1 1 Bromsgrove District Council 1 2 2 Doncaster Borough Council 1 1 1 Harrogate District Council 1 1 1 Manchester City Council 2 2 2 Elmbridge Borough Council 1 1 1 Durham County Council 1 1 1 South Tyneside Borough Council 1 1 1 Gateshead Borough Council 1 1 1 Lancashire County Council 1 1 1 Cleveland County Council 1 1 1 Surrey County Council 1 1 1 London Borough of Harrow 2 4 4 Colchester Borough Council 1 1 1 London Borough of Tower Hamlets 1 1 1 St. Helens Borough Council 1 1 1 Berkshire County Council 1 1 1 London Borough of Greenwich 2 2 2 Cornwall County Council 1 1 1 London Borough of Haringey 1 2 2 London Borough of Barking and Dagenham 1 1 1 London Borough of Redbridge 1 1 1 Corporation of London 1 3 3 Bedford Borough Council 1 1 1 Wrekin Council 1 1 1 Newark and Sherwood District Council 1 1 1 Humberside County Council 1 2 2 Rochdale Borough Council 1 1 1 Liverpool City Council 1 1 1 These figures have not been validated.
There have, of course, been successive cuts to the HSE's grant-in-aid over recent years. Despite considerable difficulty, HSE has sought to meet these budget reductions with least harm to its key areas of work such as inspection and other field activity. Nevertheless, this can lead to heavy workloads associated with 522W prosecution, discouraging it—especially when pitifully low fines from magistrates are taken into account. We are looking closely at this.