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Mr. Cope : I refer the hon. Member to the answer that I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, West (Mr. Maples) on 13 July, Official Report, columns 581-2 .
Training and Enterprise Councils
Mrs. Gorman : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made of the extent to which small firms will benefit from the establishment of the training and enterprise councils ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Cope : Training and enterprise councils will be contractually responsible to the Government within their areas for three programmes currently run by the Training Agency area offices--the enterprise allowance scheme, business growth training and small firms counselling--and they will work with local enterprise agencies and others to ensure a coherent network of support for small firms.
Training
Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what community input he requires of the employment training scheme.
Mr. Nicholls : Employment training is a training programme. Activities of a broader community benefit are also carried out when these are compatible with providing training.
TEC System
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment for which TEC he has agreed to supply development funding.
Mr. Cope : On 12 July, I announced development funding for 19 training and enterprise councils. They are listed in the table. List of TEC areas that have been approved for development funding as at 12 July South East :
Essex
Hampshire
Hertfordshire
Isle of Wight
Milton Keynes
South West :
Devon and Cornwall
Dorset
West Midlands :
Birmingham
North West Midlands
Walsall
Yorkshire and Humberside :
Calderdale and Kirklees
Sheffield
North West :
Cumbria
East Lancashire
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OldhamRochdale
South East Cheshire
Northern :
Teesside
Tyneside
Disablement Resettlement Service
Mr. Ashley : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what percentage of the staff of the disablement resettlement service are currently registered as disabled.
Mr. Lee : The percentage of staff of the disablement resettlement service who are registered as disabled is currently 7.2 per cent.
Part-time Employment
Mr. Wray : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what are the latest figures for the growth of part-time employment in (a) England, (b) Scotland and (c) Wales.
Mr. Lee : Information on part-time employment for sub-national areas is available only in respect of female employees in employment and participants on work-related Government training programmes (who are counted as in part-time employment). Estimates are not available for male employees in employment, nor for the self-employed. The information available on the growth in part-time employment between March 1988 and March 1989--the latest date for which figures are available--is as follows :
Changes between March 1988 and March 1989 Female part-time All work-related employees in employment Government training programmes |Changes thousand|Per cent. |Changes thousand|Per cent. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------England |99 |2.7 |77 |28.4 Scotland |5 |1.4 |17 |42.0 Wales |4 |2.2 |10 |49.5
Skill Shortages
Mr. Meacher : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment when he expects to publish his Department's survey of skill shortages and the impact of 1992.
Mr. Cope : The Department has commissioned the Institute of Manpower Studies to carry out a study of the approach to a European-wide labour market being adopted by a group of major multinational employers. The date of publications will be decided when the work is completed.
Lorry Drivers (Pay)
Mr. Mudd : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is the average weekly gross pay for a British lorry driver holding heavy goods vehicle 1 classification.
Mr. Nicholls : The average gross weekly earnings of male drivers of heavy goods vehicles (over 3 tonnes) in Great Britain was estimated to be £216.9 in April 1988, the
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latest date for which information is available. This figure relates to full-time employees on adult rates of pay whose earnings were not affected by absence.Injuries (Pupils)
Ms. Armstrong : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many fatalities were reported caused by injuries to pupils at school for the years 1 April 1986 to 31 March 1987 and 1 April 1987 to 31 March 1988 ; and what were the causes of those fatalities.
Mr. Nicholls : In the year beginning 1 April 1986, four fatal injuries to pupils at schools were reported to the enforcing authorities. In the following year, five fatal injuries were reported. Details of the causes of those fatalities are given in the table.
Fatal injuries to pupils at schools
Reported to the enforcing authorities
1986-87
--blow to the head during a game of rugby.
--wall collapsed during high winds.
--fall from two storeys through an open window.
--slipping on a concrete slab.
1987-88
--septicaemia after fracture caused by a fall.
--choking on a pen top.
--collapse following an exercise on a trampoline.
--accident involving a reversing delivery van (two fatalities). Nursery, primary and secondary education level schools. Reported to HSE's factory and agricultural inspectorates, the relevant enforcing authorities for the education sector, under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1985.
Ms. Armstrong : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many inspectors there are to inspect schools for the purposes of health and safety ; how many inspections of schools were carried out in the years 1 March 1986 to 31 March 1987 and 1 April 1987 to 31 March 1988 ; how many prosecutions followed these inspections ; and how many enforcement notices followed the prosecutions.
Mr. Nicholls : Inspectors based in the Health and Safety Executive's (HSE's) area offices have a range of inspection responsibilities and no inspectors are employed solely on the inspection of schools.
A total of 679 inspections of schools were carried out between 1 April 1986 and 31 March 1987 and 940 between 1 April 1987 and 31 March 1988.
The table shows the number of prosecutions taken by HSE against the education sector, which includes all educational establishments and the number of enforcement notices issued in 1986-87 and 1987-88 :
Year |Number of prosecutions |Number of notices issued ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 April 1986 to 31 March 1987 |4 |24 1 April 1987 to 31 March 1988 |6 |28
It is not possible to identify, without incurring disproportionate cost, how many prosecutions were taken following inspections or how many notices were issued following prosecutions.
Ms. Armstrong : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if he will give a breakdown of major injury figures to children at school for the different local
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authority areas for the years 1 April 1986 to 31 March 1987 and 1 April 1987 to 31 March 1988 together with the pupil- injury ratio for each authority.Mr. Nicholls : Information in the form requested could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Ms. Armstrong : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what was the national total for major injuries to pupils at school in the year 1 April 1987 to 31 March 1988.
Mr. Nicholls : In the year beginning 1 April 1987, 7,684 major injuries to pupils in nursery, primary and secondary education schools were reported to the enforcing authorities under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1985.
Earnings
Mr. Madden : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what are the maximum and minimum hourly basic rates of pay, recorded by the Leeds office of the Manpower Services Commission, from advertised posts in the private and voluntary sector, for the following posts (a) charge care staff, (b) senior care staff, (c) care staff, (d) cooks, (e) general assistants, (f) washing up staff, (g) housekeepers, (h) laundry assistants and (i) therapists.
Mr. Nicholls : The maximum and minimum hourly rates of pay for posts in the private sector advertised at Leeds jobcentre at the latest available date (13 July) are as follows :
Post |Minimum rate|Maximum rate £ |£ ---------------------------------------------------------Care staff |2.20 |2.80 Cooks |2.00 |2.80 General assistant |1.93 |2.70 Washing-up staff |1.93 |2.70 Laundry staff |1.93 |2.70
There were no vacancies advertised for other occupations requested or for the voluntary sector.
Mr. Madden : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what regulations apply to residential homes in the private-voluntary sector concerning hourly basic rates paid to staff.
Mr. Nicholls : Wages council statutory minimum wage regulations under the 1986 Wages Act cover licensed residential establishments, but nursing and residential homes for the elderly and infirm are excluded.
Employment Training
Mr. Corbett : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what information he has about the number of ET placements in the west midlands region.
Mr. Nicholls : We estimate that more than 17,000 people on employment training in the west midlands region are on placements with employers or projects on any one day.
Secondary Picketing
Mr. Butler : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made of public opinion regarding the Government's reform of the law on secondary picketing ; and if he will make a statement.
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Mr. Nicholls : The Government's reform of industrial relations and trade union law since 1979, including measures to limit the scope for particularly unacceptable forms of industrial action, has been popular with employers, union members and the public alike. The law must, of course, be kept under review to ensure that the legal framework reflects the needs of our economy and society now and for the immediate future.
NATIONAL FINANCE
Stamp Duty (Scotland)
Mr. Dewar : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much money has been received by the stamp office in Scotland each year for the past five years in respect of domestic conveyancing.
Mr. Norman Lamont : Information available does not distinguish receipts from conveyances of residential property in Scotland. The yields from stamp duty collected by the stamp office in Scotland in respect of all conveyances-on-sale of property are as follows :
|£ million ------------------------------1984-85 |18.9 1985-86 |20.3 1986-87 |24.4 1987-88 |30.1 1988-89 |44.9
In addition, amounts of less than £1 million have been received each year in respect of voluntary conveyances.
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Earned Income
Sir Dudley Smith : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) how many individuals in the United Kingdom had an earned income of £50, 000 or more per annum at the last analysis ;
(2) how many individuals in the United Kingdom have an annual earned income of (a) over £500,000 per year, (b) £300,000 per year, (c) £200,000 per year and (d) £100,000 given the most up-to-date Inland Revenue figures.
Mr. Norman Lamont : The latest data cover 1986-87, when it is estimated that about 78,000 individuals had earned income of over £50,000 and about 15,000 had earned income of over £100,000. It is difficult to make reliable estimates at higher levels of earned income, but there were probably not more than about 3,000 individuals with earned income exceeding £200,000.
Premium Bonds
Mr. Chris Smith : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many purchases of premium bonds, in each of the last three years for which figures are available, were made in (a) amounts of over £100 and (b) amounts of £100 or less.
Mr. Lilley [pursuant to his reply, 12 July 1989, c. 518. : I regret that a digit was erroneously added to the value of the number of premium bonds sold in 1986-87 costing less than £100 ; the value of the 1,718,000 bonds sold should have been £33,821,000 rather than £331,821,000.
The amended table is as follows :
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Financial yea£100 or more Under £100 |Number |Value |Number |Value |£ |£ ------------------------------------------------------------------------1986-87 |380,000 |182,621,000|1,718,000 |33,821,000 1987-88 |443,000 |260,601,000|1,730,000 |34,533,000 1988-89 |457,000 |273,171,000|1,742,000 |36,122,000
Inland Revenue (Costs)
Mr. Andrew Smith : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the cost to the Inland Revenue per annum per annual account of administering (a) schedule E, (b) higher rate taxation and (c) schedule D.
Mr. Norman Lamont [holding answer 11 July 1989] : The average unit cost per case for employees (taxed under schedule E) was £12.61 in 1988-89, and for the self-employed (taxed under schedule D) was £46.30. These average costs include the costs of dealing with higher rate tax and capital gains of employees and the self-employed respectively, and also of collecting national insurance contributions. Separate unit costs for taxpayers liable to higher rate tax, who may be taxed under schedule E or schedule D, are not available. Further details of Revenue unit costs are given in the Inland Revenue's recently published "1988 Management Plan".
Private Currencies
Mrs. Gorman : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he has received any representations on the effect of privatised competing currencies on inflation.
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Mr. Lilley : My right hon. Friend has received a number of representations on this subject.
Personal Debt
Sir Russell Johnston : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he expects to reply to the letter sent to him by the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber on 17 February, about which a reminder was sent on 20 June, on the problem of personal debt.
Mr. Lilley : I replied to the hon. Member's letter on 10 July.
Privatisation
Dr. Cunningham : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer is he will list, in respect of previous privatisations, the timetable for the advertisement and publication of full prospectuses.
Mr. Norman Lamont [holding answer 13 July 1989] : The publication dates for the full prospectuses in respect of privatisations and secondary share sales since British Telecom are set out in the table :
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|Offer price announced |Prospectus published |Application lists opened |("impact day") |and closed -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------British Telecom |16 November 1984 |20 November 1984 |28 November 1984 British Aerospace | 1 May 1985 | 4 May 1985 |10 May 1985 Britoil |30 July 1985 | 1 August 1985 | 8 August 1985 Cable and Wireless | 3 December 1985 | 5 December 1985 |11 December 1985 British Gas |21 November 1986 |25 November 1986 | 3 December 1986 British Airways |27 January 1987 |30 January 1987 | 6 February 1987 BAA | 8 July 1987 |10 July 1987 |16 July 1987 Rolls-Royce |27 April 1987 |30 April 1987 | 7 May 1987 BP |15 October 1987 |20 October 1987 |28 October 1987 British Steel |23 November 1988 |25 November 1988 | 2 December 1988
Inflation
Mr. Steinberg : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he intends to seek to remove his obligation under the Industry Act to provide an inflation forecast.
Debt Repayment
Mr. Dalyell : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make a statement on ways in which the International Monetary Fund and World Bank responds to emergency situations such as earthquakes destroying oil pipelines with consequent effect on debt repayment.
Mr. Lilley : Both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are able to respond to unexpected exogenous shocks to mitigate the effects on a member's economy. For example, the International Monetary Fund counteracted the adverse effect on Ecuador's balance of payments, mainly resulting from damage caused to an oil pipeline by an earthquake, by disbursing SDR 42.7 million in the form of a contingency financing facility. The World Bank approved an $80 million emergency petroleum reconstruction project loan at the same time.
Banks (Information Disclosure)
Mr. McCrindle : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will introduce legislation concerning the handling of references and the disclosure of information to credit reference agencies by banks about customers ; and if he will make a statement.
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