Written question asked by Nigel Evans (Conservative) on Tuesday, 10 June 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Friday, 13 June 2008. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Monday, 16 June 2008 on behalf of the Home Office.

Fireworks: Lancashire

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many arrests there were for misuse of fireworks in (a) Ribble Valley constituency, (b) Lancashire and (c) England in each of the last three years.

Answer: [holding answer 13 June 2008]: The arrests collection undertaken by the Ministry of Justice provides data on persons arrested for recorded crime (notifiable offences) only. Summary offences on the misuse of fireworks do not form part of this collection.The Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 extended the list of offences under section 1 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 to allow the police to stop and search for prohibited fireworks. From information reported centrally on the number of resultant arrests we are not able to identify specific offences for which an arrest has been made.

Secondary information