I have been asked to reply on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

On 2 May 2012, I announced that the Government will consult on whether to amend the small claims threshold for damages for personal injury claims. The consultation document and its related impact assessments will be published shortly and will be available to download from both the Ministry of Justice and Citizen Space websites.

No decisions will be taken on the way forward in this area until all responses to the consultation document and other stakeholder submissions have been considered.

Ministry of Justice, Department of Health and HM Treasury officials have been working closely together to develop the consultation proposals and accompanying impact assessments. The latter will consider the effect of the proposals on all impacted groups, including law firms and claimants. The Government welcomes contributions and evidence from all stakeholders on the potential impacts of these proposals on all affected groups.

The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) can only provide reliable figures for how much it paid in relation to specific injuries, as described in the Tariff of Injuries in the Criminal Injuries Compensation Schemes. No injury descriptions in the Tariff relate specifically to dog attacks or workplace incidents.

I have arranged for this information to be deposited in the House Library. Some injuries are duplicated because they attracted different amounts of compensation under the 1996, 2001 and 2008 Criminal Injuries Compensation Schemes.

The amount of legal aid payments recovered under recovery of defence cost orders (RDCOs) and Crown court means testing (CCMT) for each of the last three years is provided in the following table:

For accounting purposes, the amounts recovered under CCMT are only recognised as income once a defendant has been convicted and a final assessment of defence costs has taken place.

On 2 May 2012, I announced that the Government will consult on whether to amend the small claims threshold for damages for personal injury claims. The consultation document and its related impact assessments will be published shortly and will be available to download from both the Ministry of Justice and Citizen Space websites.

No decisions will be taken on the way forward in this area until all responses to the consultation document and other stakeholder submissions have been considered.

Ministry of Justice, Department of Health and HM Treasury officials have been working closely together to develop the consultation proposals and accompanying impact assessments. The latter will consider the effect of the proposals on all impacted groups, including law firms and claimants. The Government welcomes contributions and evidence from all stakeholders on the potential impacts of these proposals on all affected groups.

On 2 May 2012, I announced that the Government will consult on whether to amend the small claims threshold for damages for personal injury claims. The consultation document and its related impact assessments will be published shortly and will be available to download from both the Ministry of Justice and Citizen Space websites.

No decisions will be taken on the way forward in this area until all responses to the consultation document and other stakeholder submissions have been considered.

Ministry of Justice, Department of Health and HM Treasury officials have been working closely together to develop the consultation proposals and accompanying impact assessments. The latter will consider the effect of the proposals on all impacted groups, including law firms and claimants. The Government welcomes contributions and evidence from all stakeholders on the potential impacts of these proposals on all affected groups.

I have been asked to reply on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

HM Courts and Tribunals Service systems do not identify the outstanding balance of fines imposed by specific prosecutors or for specific offences and therefore this information could be provided only at disproportionate cost as it would require a manual search of all fine accounts.

A survey of burial grounds conducted in 2005 concluded that there would be a median remaining lifetime of 30 years (i.e. until 2035) for existing burial grounds if current levels of demand continue.

The issue of burial space is routinely discussed at bi-annual meetings of the Burial and Cremation Advisory Group, which is chaired by the Ministry of Justice.

Less invasive post-mortem examinations are permitted under coroner legislation. The legislation also allows coroners to issue certificates to allow removal of the body from the jurisdiction to facilitate burial abroad where this is desired for religious reasons. The Charter for Coroner Services, issued by the Ministry of Justice in March 2012, states that coroners should take account of families' religious and community requirements during the inquest process where this is compatible with the coroner's statutory duties.

The Ministry of Justice publishes information, both quarterly and annually, on the workloads before tribunals administered by Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service. This information includes statistics on the receipts, disposals and outstanding (or 'live') caseload in the employment tribunals system. Statistics are available online at:

http://www.justice.gov.uk/statistics/tribunals

In the financial year 2011-12, employment tribunals received 186,300 new claims. Of those new claim receipts, 59,200 were 'singles' and 127,100 were 'multiples'. The multiple claims were grouped into 4,300 actions, or 'multiple claim cases'.

At the end of the financial year 2011-12, the employment tribunals had a live caseload of 540,800 claims. That total was made up of 26,500 singles claims (a fall of 7% from the end of the previous financial year) and 514,300 multiples claims, the large majority of which were stayed pending appellate decisions or otherwise unready for final hearing. Information on the total number of outstanding multiple claims cases is not yet available. I will write to the hon. Member with the information as soon as my officials can provide it.

The Immigration Advisory Service was placed into administration on 8 July 2011. Following the orderly transfer of legal aid clients to new providers by the Legal Services Commission, the court ordered that the administrators allow three months for former clients of IAS to make requests for their archived files. This opportunity closed on 28 May 2012 and any remaining files are expected to be securely destroyed.

The information requested is not readily available: it involves matching data in different formats from several current and legacy legal aid schemes from which the information could be extracted only at disproportionate cost.

The information requested is not readily available: it involves matching data in different formats from several current and legacy legal aid schemes from which the information could be extracted only at disproportionate cost.

At the end of March 2012 the total amount of outstanding financial penalties was

£593,270,718¹. Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) cannot disaggregate this total to provide the information requested. The outstanding balance quoted is made up of financial penalties which include those not yet due, currently being paid in instalments such as deduction from benefits or by an attachment of earnings, or are in arrears.

The Government takes the issue of fine enforcement very seriously and HMCTS is working to ensure that clamping down on fine dodgers is a continued priority nationwide.

Source:

Libra Local Standard Reports as at end of March 2012

The following sums have been paid to Leigh Day & Co in each of the past five years:

These payments are for all of the firm's legal aid work over the last five years and cover multiple legal aid clients. The sums include VAT and disbursements, such as expenses incurred on cases, expert fees and translation of documents, and barristers' fees. Although paid by the LSC directly to the solicitors firm, these costs may then be paid to other parties involved in the case, so the totals do not represent the firm's earnings.

Employment tribunals in Scotland have power to deal with proceedings, in the main, where the respondent (or one of the respondents) to proceedings resides or carries on business in Scotland.

Initially, all proceedings in Scotland are processed by the Glasgow Office. Subsequently, the office that deals with a case is determined (subject to judicial direction to the contrary) by the postcode of the respondent (i.e. the employer, or former employer, against which a claim is brought). Claims where a respondent is based in the Kilmarnock and Loudoun constituency would (without further direction) remain at the Glasgow Office.

Information on the addresses of claimants (i.e. the individuals bringing proceedings) is not collated centrally and (to the extent it is held at all) could be provided only at disproportionate cost. Electronic records held by local tribunal offices are anonymised and archived one year after the disposal of the proceedings, and hard copy files are disposed of at the same time.

However, by interrogating internal management information, it is possible to provide data on the number of claims received by employment tribunals in Scotland in each financial year since 2006-07; and the number of claims accepted by employment tribunals where the respondent was based in the Kilmarnock and Loudoun constituency. Insofar as that latter category is concerned, the only information that is collated centrally dates from June 2011.

Information relating to the period March 2012 to June 2012 is subject to internal data cleansing and will not be available until the Ministry of Justice publishes its 2012-13 Quarter 1 statistics covering the tribunals administered by HM Courts and Tribunals Service.

After careful consideration, I took the view last autumn that introducing a policy of reusing graves was not critical at this time. We have, nevertheless committed to keeping the situation under review. In some circumstances section 74 of the London Local Authorities Act 2007 allows for the reuse of graves in London.

A summary job description was produced when the appointment of His Honour Judge Peter Thornton QC as Chief Coroner was announced on 22 May 2012. With the agreement of the Lord Chief Justice, a copy of this summary has been placed in the House Libraries. A full job description will be published in due course.

A written ministerial statement was made on 22 May 2012. Further information about the role and appointment can be found on the Judicial Office website at:

http://www.judiciary.gov.uk/about-the-judiciary/the-chief-coroner#headingAnchor3

The effectiveness of the regulatory response to claims management companies (CMC) is under continuous review. The Department's Claims Management Regulation Unit has established a specialist team to respond to growing concerns over the practices of some CMCs providing services for consumers bringing payment protection insurance (PPI) claims against lenders. One of the main priorities is to deal with the unacceptable increase in incidence of non sale claims made to lenders. The unit is carrying out a comprehensive programme of audits of CMCs to root out the bad practices and bring CMCs to compliance. The unit is working with the Financial Ombudsman Service and many of the major lenders to gather the evidence needed to target these investigations and has issued further guidance on the standards which CMCs must meet. Enforcement action has been and will be taken against CMCs which fail to comply.

Neither Scottish Government Ministers nor the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), have proposed any such changes.