Clause 71 - Financial reporting orders: effect
Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill
2:45 pm
Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Huntingdon, Conservative)
I wish to raise an information point. The clause does not specify that financial reporting orders are to start at the end of the custodial sentence, even though that was the position set out in the White Paper. I raise the point noting that Liberty questions whether offenders in prison would be able to comply with the requirements of an order.
I shall be interested to hear the Minister's views. I think that, given that the Bill deals with serious organised crime, the provision is right and that it should be possible to place an FRO on a Mr. Big in prison, on the grounds that he could be running a drugs empire from prison. However, compliance might not be possible for the small criminal in prison who does not have an accountant. Considering the Minister's reluctance, under previous amendments, to address the question of limiting FROs to serious cases, the point perhaps becomes more relevant.
Could the Minister also look again at subsection (10)? Is the threat of an extra maximum of 51 weeks in prison enough of an incentive to ensure compliance with an FRO by a big criminal who has earned millions of pounds from illegal activity?