With support from Government, and by working directly with police forces across the UK, the gambling industry is committed to tackling and reducing crime and bringing those who commit crimes against shop staff, customers and property to justice.

The Government takes all types of fraud and financial scams extremely seriously. The Serious and Organised Crime Strategy, published in 2013, places a strong focus on protecting those most at risk. The Home Office has recently completed a research project in order to better understand who in the UK is at risk from fraud and cyber threats, what makes them vulnerable and how to most effectively reach them. This will enable the Home Office and partners to develop ways to better protect the public, for example providing targeted fraud prevention advice.

The Home Office also works with the City of London Police, which is the national lead force for fraud, to help all police forces to understand better who is vulnerable to fraud in their areas, and to work with local partners including the voluntary sector to help protect those vulnerable people from the threat from fraud.

Action Fraud is the central reporting point for fraud and is operated by the City of London Police. It assesses the vulnerability of victims based on the financial and health impact of the reported fraud, and provides this information to forces. This enables police forces to make targeted interventions with those most at risk. When a serious threat or a new type of fraud is identified, Action Fraud places an alert on its website with advice for individuals to protect themselves from becoming victims. Members of the public can sign up to receive these alerts by email.

The Home Office is also working closely with Financial Fraud Action UK and the British Bankers Association who have issued specific advice to consumers on telephone scams. This includes helping consumers know when they may be a target to these fraudsters, and advice on what information should never be shared, e.g. PIN number. In December last year Financial Fraud Action UK and the police announced a joint declaration to help consumers avoid becoming victims of financial fraud.

The Government is responsible for the legislative structure within which local licensing authorities deliver the licensing regime for taxis and private hire vehicles. Enforcement of the licensing regime, including ensuring that private hire vehicles do not illegally ply for hire, is therefore a matter for local licensing authorities and the police.

Tackling child sexual exploitation is a top priority for this Government. We have prioritised child sexual abuse as a national threat in the Strategic Policing Requirement, setting a clear expectation on police forces to collaborate across force boundaries, to safeguard children, to share intelligence and to share best practice.

Significant progress has been made since the launch of the “Tackling CSE” report in March 2015. We have delivered the vast majority of a £7 million funding programme to support non statutory organisations that have experienced a surge in demand on their services. This funding is to support the victims and survivors of sexual abuse, including children of all ages.

Furthermore, £1.6 million has been provided over four years (April 2012 - March 2016) for 13 Young People’s Advocates providing direct and dedicated support to young people who have been victims, or are at risk of, sexual and domestic violence and/or sexual exploitation. Funding of £1.72 million per year has also been committed to part fund 87 Independent Sexual Violence Advisers posts until March 2016.

Reoffending had been too high for too long. Under the last government, we reformed the way offenders are managed in the community, so all offenders get support when they leave prison. We want to build on this to address what can be done whilst offenders are in prison, with a new emphasis on rehabilitation and redemption. Working with the voluntary, public and private sectors, we are helping offenders turn away from crime.

Research and evidence of best practice is shared widely across the United Kingdom and we engage the Devolved Administrations on a wide range of offender issues. We will ensure that these discussions include examining the most effective measures for reducing reoffending.

Our proposed funding model is based on a set of four indicators which correlate well with long term patterns of crime. The indicators cover population, population characteristics and environmental characteristics. They are used as proxies for police demand and are based on objective, robust and reliable data that can be compared across all force areas.

Decisions about the size and composition of the police workforce are an operational matter for chief officers, working with their Police and Crime Commissioner.

We continue to strongly support neighbourhood policing, and are committed to the principle that tackling local crime and anti-social behaviour should be a priority for the whole force - not just neighbourhood policing teams – working collaboratively with other local agencies, businesses and residents to respond to the problems they face.

Tackling domestic abuse is a key priority for this Government.

The Office for National Statistics has ascribed national increases in police recorded violent crime to improvements in police recording.

The Government is providing £10 million to fund specialist domestic and sexual violence services and national helplines up to April 2016, including part-funding to 23 Independent Domestic Violence Advocates and eight Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Coordinators in London. New guidance for the police has been published by the College of Policing, new training has been piloted and for the first time police are collating domestic violence data against a national standard.

The Government recognises that local areas are best placed to meet local need.

Vehicle crime is at its lowest level since 1995 and theft of vehicles has fallen over a third since 2010 according to the Independent Crime Survey for England and Wales. We are not complacent, however, and we remain alert to changes in trends. We are working very closely with the police and industry on the issue of electronic vehicle theft to ensure that, together, we have up to date responses in place.

The Government takes all forms of hate crime very seriously. Crime that is motivated by hostility or hatred towards the victim is particularly corrosive and can have devastating consequences for victims and their families. In 2012, the previous Government published a hate crime action plan and a total of 13 actions were dedicated to the prevention of disability hate crime, including the creation of a new cross government Disability Strategy, the publication of the Crown Prosecution Service Action Plan on disability hate crime and publishing examples of good practice by disabled persons’ user-led organisations. The progress report on the action plan, published in 2014, showed that we had either completed or made good progress on all actions.

The number of police-recorded hate crimes against disabled people has increased each year since records began in 2011. There were 1,753 reports in 2011/2012, 1,843 in 2012/2013 and 1,985 in 2013/2014. This could indicate that there is an increased understanding of disability hate crime by police and victims.

The Government is currently speaking to a number of organisations and individuals to inform the next steps in our strategy to tackle disability hate crime. This includes work with the Fulfilling Potential Forum, which is led by the Office for Disability Issues within DWP and is made up of around 40 disability charities, including disabled people’s user led organisations.

The Government takes all types of fraud, including those operating through telephones, extremely seriously. The Government is continuing to work closely with the police, Financial Fraud Action UK, and the British Bankers’ Association on initiatives to tackle fraud. Last year, during the ‘Know Fraud, No Fraud’ campaign, UK banks, building societies and card issuers, with the support of the police, published a Joint Declaration explaining the requests they would never ask of customers over the phone. This includes never asking a customer to authorise the transfer of funds to a new account.

The Government also recommends that any person affected by telephone scams such as vishing, formally report their case to Action Fraud. Action Fraud is a Government supported specialist fraud reporting and advice service operated by the City of London Police. When a serious threat or a new type of fraud is identified, Action Fraud places an alert on its website with advice for individuals to protect themselves from becoming victims. Members of the public can sign up to receive these alerts by email.

Ofcom, the communications regulator in the UK, has worked closely with the Metropolitan Police Service, Action Fraud and landline providers to prevent criminals exploiting phone lines to trick and defraud members of the public. All landline providers have now reduced the time a call remains open after one party hangs up down to two seconds. This makes it much more difficult for criminals to exploit phone lines in this way.

We have taken decisive action to reduce reoffending. For the first time in recent history those sentenced to less than 12 months in custody receive probation support on release. We have also opened up the delivery of rehabilitation services to a diverse range of providers, including private and voluntary sector organisations. While there is no specific national target for reducing reoffending, Community Rehabilitation Companies are incentivised to help offenders turn their backs on crime and will only be paid in full if they are successful in reducing reoffending.

The government is currently considering what options there may be for strengthening and improving the current community sentence framework, and in particular the role that technology may play in this. No decisions have yet been made.

We are committed to preventing youth offending and supporting families. We contribute to the Youth Engagement Fund which is using social impact bonds to support up to 8,000 disadvantaged young people to improve their educational qualifications and secure employment which will reduce their risk of becoming involved in offending. We have also introduced family engagement workers in young adult and women’s prisons to help strengthen family relationships.

We regularly engage with faith groups and other partners on the measures in our new Counter-Extremism Strategy.

Extremism Disruption Orders will be an important new power to help restrict the harmful activity of extremist individuals.

Home Office Ministers and officials have meetings with a variety of international partners, as well as organisations and individuals in the public and private sectors, as part of the process of policy development and delivery. Details of these meetings are published on a quarterly basis and can be found at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/home-office-mnisters-hospitality-data.

The Government takes fraud extremely seriously. The Serious and Organised Crime Strategy, published in 2013, places a strong focus on protecting those most at risk. The Home Office works with the City of London Police to help police forces to understand better who is vulnerable to fraud in their areas, and to work with local partners including the voluntary sector to help protect vulnerable people from the threat from fraud. This has included specific targeted activity with the vulnerable and the elderly, for example, a public campaign.

The Care Act 2014 also places a new statutory requirement for all local areas to have a Safeguarding Adults Board, comprised of the police, the local authority and Clinical Commissioning Group to protect the most vulnerable in their communities from all forms of harm, including financial harm.

We are also working closely with Financial Fraud Action UK and the British Bankers Association who have issued advice to consumers on telephone scams. This includes helping consumers know when they may be a target to these fraudsters, and advice on what information should never be shared, e.g. PIN number.

The Government takes fraud extremely seriously. The Serious and Organised Crime Strategy, published in 2013, places a strong focus on protecting those most at risk. The Home Office works with the City of London Police to help police forces to understand better who is vulnerable to fraud in their areas, and to work with local partners including the voluntary sector to help protect vulnerable people from the threat from fraud. This has included specific targeted activity with the vulnerable and the elderly, for example, a public campaign.

The Care Act 2014 also places a new statutory requirement for all local areas to have a Safeguarding Adults Board, comprised of the police, the local authority and Clinical Commissioning Group to protect the most vulnerable in their communities from all forms of harm, including financial harm.

We are also working closely with Financial Fraud Action UK and the British Bankers Association who have issued advice to consumers on telephone scams. This includes helping consumers know when they may be a target to these fraudsters, and advice on what information should never be shared, e.g. PIN number.