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Written question asked by David Ruffley (Conservative) on Tuesday, 13 March 2007, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 15 March 2007. It was answered by Joan Ryan (Labour) on Thursday, 22 March 2007 on behalf of the Home Office.

Police: Vetting

Question
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the average time taken by the police force in (a) Suffolk, (b) Bedfordshire, (c) Cambridgeshire, (d) Essex, (e) Hertfordshire and (f) Norfolk was to respond to inquiries from the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) as part of routine CRB checks in each year since 1997.
Answer

The following table illustrates the average number of days taken by the police forces in (a) Suffolk, (b) Bedfordshire (c) Cambridgeshire, (d) Essex, (e) Hertfordshire and (f) Norfolk to conduct checks against their local intelligence systems between the launch of the CRB disclosure service on 11 March 2002 to the end of February 2007.

Average turnaround times
Financial year
2002-03 2003-04 2004-05 2005-06 2006-07
Bedfordshire 2.1 1.9 4.9 2.5 3.7
Cambridgeshire 14.1 13.0 18.9 16.2 18.6
Essex 9.6 12.0 20.4 8.5 14.3
Hertfordshire 5.0 5.2 14.9 13.8 14.4
Norfolk 3.5 7.1 8.0 18.5 29.8
Suffolk 14.8 11.8 12.3 14.4 11.2

A revised service level agreement (SLA) came into effect in April 2006 between the CRB and the 43 police forces of England and Wales. This new agreement, which was agreed by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) places an additional focus on delivery and the responsibility of Chief Officers and ACPO to ensure that the obligations within the SLA are met. Monthly performance figures since April 2006 are now published on the CRB website at:"www.crb.gov.uk"

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
458 c1068-9W; 127870
Session
2006-07
Subjects
Police Vetting
Link
View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk