AQO 7788/11-15 Oral question to the Minister of Justice
To ask the Minister of Justice for his assessment of the efficiency of the current Access Northern Ireland system.
Asked by Claire Sugden MLA on 26 February 2015
- Answered
- Oral
- Answered in the Chamber
- Tabled
- 26 February 2015
- Answer due by
- 10 March 2015
- Answered
- 10 March 201512 days after tabling
- Department
- Department of Justice
- Priority question
- No
Answer
Answered in the Assembly Chamber on 10 March 2015. Extract from the Official Report (Hansard), including any supplementary questions:
Mr Ford
Access NI issues all applications for standard and basic checks within three to five days, and over 70% of enhanced applications are issued in six to eight days. Given that 125,000 applications are made to Access NI each year, I believe that that is a good indicator of efficiency. That said, some cases take longer. Those are cases that are referred to the police for consideration. The vast bulk of those are also turned around efficiently, but I acknowledge, as does the PSNI, that delays are occurring and that they can be significant at times. Mindful of the impact on applicants who are unable to secure positions of employment without an Access NI check, my officials are working closely with the PSNI to reduce the delays being experienced by a small minority of applicants. The PSNI has approved additional resources for that work, but it will take time to effect the necessary improvements and reduce the current backlog.
Ms Sugden
I thank the Minister for his answer, but I was actually referring to the inefficiency of having to get a new Access NI form for every organisation that you are involved with. That is ridiculous, and it places a heavy burden on the community and voluntary sector in particular. In light of that, how has the Minister consulted the community and voluntary sector?
Mr Ford
I entirely agree with Ms Sugden. Before the change of the last Westminster Government and during the first year of the devolution of justice, work was being done to look at a portable check. However, that was changed because of changes in the Home Office that meant that we could not proceed on the timescale that we had hoped. We have included provisions for the introduction of a portable check in the Justice Bill, which is at Committee Stage. Perhaps Ms Sugden would like to ask the Chair of the Committee how speedily he will progress that. It is clear that we need to move to a portable check as soon as possible, although it may not be available until some time during the next calendar year because of the issues that need to be addressed to tie the system to the available resources. We will also look at the charges. In England and Wales, it costs £13 to be annually registered, which is somewhat less than the current one-off fee in Northern Ireland. However, it will continue to be free for those who use the check purely for volunteering purposes.
I would hope that we would see progress arising from the work that is being done by my officials in parallel with the progress of the Bill, but, clearly and unfortunately, it will be 2016 before we see it in place.
Mr Principal Deputy Speaker
Mr Trevor Lunn is not in his place.
Mr McCarthy
I am delighted that the Minister continues to answer questions briefly and succinctly because it brings us up to question 14.