Chapter I: General
Section 71: Access to driver licensing records
170.Section 71 provides for the Secretary of State to make driver licensing records available to the Police Information Technology Organisation for use by the police. The intention is that this information will be transferred on to the Police National Computer (PNC).
171.These records will include the licence holder’s name, address, sex, date of birth, country of birth (where known), driver number, type of licence held, classes of vehicle covered, other relevant restrictions on driving entitlement, endorsements, penalty points, licence commencement and expiry date. They will also include an electronic photograph and electronic signature which are an integral part of the photo-card driving licence record which the PNC is not currently able to store, but provision needs to made now to allow transfer of this data for a time when the PNC is able to store it.
Section 72: Failure to secure regular attendance at school: increase in penalty
172.Section 72 inserts a new offence in Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 which is committed where a parent knows that their child is failing to attend school and fails to cause him to do so without reasonable justification. The penalty for the new offence is a fine of up to £2,500, that is up to level 4 on the standard scale of offences, and/or imprisonment for three months or less.
Section 73: Parenting orders: responsible officer
173.Section 73 extends the range of persons who may serve as responsible officer under a parenting order under Section 8 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. This is currently limited under Section 8(8) of the 1998 Act to a probation officer, a social worker of a local authority social services department or a member of a youth offending team. Section 70 enables local education authority staff working outside youth offending teams to serve as responsible officer under a parenting order. Such staff could include education welfare officers and education social workers.
Schedules:
