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Mr. Alan Clark : A group of military and civilian experts meets as required to assess the military significance of export licence applications for Iran and Iraq.

Defence Select Committee (Leak Allegations)

Mr. Graham : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) how much it cost to send MOD police to investigate the alleged leak of documents supplied to the Select Committee on Defence in 1989 ; and if he will break this figure down into (a) overnight accommodation, (b) wages or salaries and (c) travel costs ;

(2) whether he authorised two police inspectors to travel to London to investigate a report in the Greenock Telegraph about a report by the MOD Police Federation submitted to a House of Commons Select Committee.

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Mr. Neubert : The responsibility for initiating police investigations is a constabulary matter, and not one in which Ministers have any role. In this instance, investigations were begun on the authority of a senior Ministry of Defence police officer, who, in good faith, believing that material contained in a press article could only have originated from a breach of security, sent two CID officers to London to make inquiries. Further checks, however, confirmed that no breach of security had been committed. The investigation was therefore immediately cancelled. The extra costs involved were confined to fares and normal allowances.

Bishopton Royal Ordnance Factory

Mr. Graham : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether the Strathclyde Police Federation was consulted over the withdrawal of MOD police from Bishopton royal ordnance factory and the armed coverage to be provided by Strathclyde police.

Mr. Neubert : Any consultation with the Strathclyde branch of the Scottish Police Federation over future arrangements at Bishopton concerning their force would be for the chief constable of Strathclyde.

Mr. Graham : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many times the MOD police has been called to investigate intruders at the Bishopton royal ordnance factory since 1985.

Mr. Neubert : Since 1 January 1986 there have been three such occasions.

British Defence Policy 1990-91"

Mr. Madden : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many copies of "British Defence Policy 1990-91" were issued before a printing error on page 5 was discovered ;

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how many second copies he expects to issue ; and what is the total cost of printing and distributing both copies of this publication.

Mr. Archie Hamilton : We expect to distribute approximately 100,000 copies of "British Defence Policy 1990-91". Design and printing costs will be of the order of £90,000 ex VAT. The publication is distributed in a variety of ways, internally and externally, and it is not possible to put a figure on distribution costs. The printing error was contained in an initial batch of 2,000 about half of which were distributed. A total of 2,000 corrected replacement copies were produced at no extra cost to the Ministry of Defence.

Adjutant-General

Mr. Mans : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what progress has been made in his review of functions and services in the Department of the Adjutant-General ; and whether he will make a statement.

Mr. Archie Hamilton : This review has now advanced to the point where my right hon. Friend has decided in principle that an Adjutant- General's Corps should be formed. Further work will now proceed to give effect to this decision and, in particular, to establish which existing corps and functions should be included in this new corps.

The corps to be considered are the Royal Army Chaplains Department, the Corps of Royal Military Police, the Royal Army Pay Corps, the Military Provost Staff Corps, the Royal Army Educational Corps and the Army Legal Corps.

In addition, the staff clerk functions currently carried out by members of the Royal Army Ordnance Corps and the Women's Royal Army Corps will be considered for inclusion in the new corps.

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