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Judges and Recorders
Mr. Gareth Wardell : To ask the Attorney-General if he will publish the names of all judges and recorders practising in the courts of England and Wales, together with (a) their annual salaries and (b) whether they possess graduate qualifications in a science subject.
The Attorney-General : As at 1 November 1991, in England and Wales there were over 800 judges including district judges, circuit judges, High Court judges and the more senior judiciary. There were also some 780 recorders, a few of whom were also district judges. The names of recorders, circuit judges, High Court judges and the more senior judiciary are published regularly in a number of reference books. The current annual salaries of judges, and of tribunal posts occupied by serving judges are set out in the table. The salaries are due to increase on 1 December 1991.
The office of recorder is a part-time appointment and fees are paid for each day sat. The current daily rate is £281, but this will increase to £286 on 1 December 1991.
Information about the educational qualifications of post-holders is not readily available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
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Judicial Salaries
|From |From |From
|1 April 1991 |1 August 1991 |1 December
|1991
|£ |£ |£
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. |Lord Chief Justice |102,950
2. |Lords of Appeal |95,150
Master of the Rolls
3. |Lords Justices of Appeal |91,400
President of the Family Division
Vice Chancellor
4. |High Court Judges |82,800
4a. |Official Referees (London)|72,000
5. |Senior Circuit Judges |65,250
Recorder of Liverpool
Recorder of Manchester
Chief Social Security Commissioner
(England and Wales)
President, Industrial Tribunals (England and
Wales)
Judge Advocate General
President, Social Security Appeal Tribunals
and Medical Appeal Tribunals (England
and Wales)
President, VAT Tribunals and Presiding
Special Commissioner of Income Tax
6. |Circuit Judges |58,800
Senior District Judge Family Division
7. |District Judges PRFD |48,200
District Judges
FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS
Partial Test Ban Treaty
Mr. Cohen : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs for what reason the United Kingdom voted against the continuing of consultations by the President at the January 1991 partial test ban treaty amendment conference.
Mr. Hogg : We believe that the conference on disarmament provides the best forum for discussion on nuclear testing issues. We were therefore unable to support the idea of resuming the work of the PTBTAC.
Iraqi Assets
Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs by what means will Iraqi assets unfrozen on 22 November be allocated to the Iraqi Government.
Mr. Douglas Hogg : Iraqi assets will be unfrozen only for direct payment to United Kingdom exporters of goods of British origin covered by a valid licence issued for the export of food, medicine and other humanitarian goods permitted under United Nations Security Council resolutions 661 and 687.
Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will list details of those items that can be purchased with unfrozen Iraqi assets.
Mr. Douglas Hogg : Iraqi assets unfrozen in this country can be used only to purchase from the United Kingdom
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food, medicine and other humanitarian goods as permitted under United Nations Security Council resolutions 661 and 687.Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what restrictions will be imposed on the use of Iraqi unfrozen assets.
Mr. Douglas Hogg : Iraqi assets unfrozen in this country may be used only to pay for exports from the United Kingdom of food, medicine and other humanitarian goods as permitted under United Nations Security Council resolutions 661 and 687.
Mr. Robert Serry
Mr. Burns : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the extradition of Robert Serry from the Turks and Caicos islands to Tampa, Florida, to face trial on charges relating to the trafficking of substantial quantities of cocaine.
Mr. Lennox-Boyd : The arrest of Robert Serry was the most significant since that of Carlos Lehder in February 1987. It is of immense credit to the forces of law and order in the dependent territory of the Turks and Caicos islands that they apprehended Serry in March 1991, and that the Attorney-General's chambers successfully conducted the case for his extradition to Florida. It is a mark of the close co-operation we and the US authorities maintain in the anti-narcotics campaign in the Caribbean.
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OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT
Aid
Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what is his estimate of the funds which return to the United Kingdom for every £1 spent on (a) bilateral development aid and (b) multilateral development aid.
Mrs. Chalker : On the basis of the figures for procurement now provided by the multilateral agencies, I estimate that for the period 1982- 89 average procurement of British goods and services amounted to £1.40 for every £1 contributed by the United Kingdom to multilateral aid funds. Because the origin of goods and services purchased under the untied element of the bilateral aid programme is not recorded, it is not possible to make a similar estimate for bilateral aid.
Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the proportion of the bilateral aid budget fully and freely available for worldwide procurement, and untied, between the years 1979 to the present day.
Mrs. Chalker : The proportion of the gross bilateral aid programme which was untied in the years 1979-1990 (the latest year for which figures are available) is as follows :
United Kingdom untied aid as a percentage of total United Kingdom gross bilateral aid 1979-1990 Year |Per cent. ------------------------------ 1979 |19.6 1980 |26.0 1981 |28.9 1982 |25.1 1983 |28.9 1984 |34.8 1985 |33.4 1986 |25.3 1987 |26.2 1988 |29.7 1989 |28.0 1990 |28.7
ENERGY
Coal Products Ltd.
Mr. Arbuthnot : To ask the Secretary of State for Energy if he will make a statement on the loan which Coal Products Ltd. has negotiated from the European Coal and Steel Community.
Mr. Wakeham : I can confirm that Coal Products Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of British Coal, has been offered a £10,000,000 loan by the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). The loan will attract an interest rate rebate worth about £1.8 million over the five-year life of the loan. The ECSC requires that the loan should be guaranteed. British Coal will act as guarantor and, in keeping with my predecessor's assurance to the House on 18 March 1988, the guarantee is being negotiated on commercial terms on an arm's-length basis.
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ENVIRONMENT
Fish Farming
Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he expects the control on buildings and structures in connection with inland fish-farming operations, envisaged in annex A to his Department's monthly bulletin for August 1991, will come into effect.
Toxic Waste Plants
Mr. Martyn Jones : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what criteria apply to his consideration of applications for toxic waste plants.
Mr. Baldry : Toxic waste plants require approval by local planning authorities in the light of criteria contained in development plans, waste disposal plans, and statutorily required environmental impact assessments. Waste treatment plants also need disposal licences from local waste disposal authorities and these licences are required to be determined in relation to risks of water pollution and danger to public health.
Those plants involving incineration are also prescribed processes under part 1 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. This requires local authorisations regarding standards of emissions to air in relation to facilities with a capacity of less than 1 tonne per hour and for facilities of greater capacity a full authorisation by HMIP (thereby dispensing with the need for a disposal licence) covering emissions to all media. Guidance on the best available techniques not entailing excessive costs (BATNEEC) for the different types of plant is provided for HMIP and local authority inspectors.
All such decisions are subject to appeal to the Secretary of State and he also has a right to call in planning applications, but he will generally do so only if planning issues of more than local importance are involved. His criteria for deciding such cases must depend upon the specific issues brought before him by the parties involved.
Atmospheric Pollution
Mr. Butler : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on trends in atmospheric pollution caused by (a) nitrogen dioxide and (b) low-level ozone.
Mr. Baldry : Trends in concentrations of nitrogen dioxide and low- level ozone are described in the second and first reports respectively of the United Kingdom photochemical oxidants review group, copies of which are in the Library of the House. In some rural areas, annual mean concentrations of nitrogen dioxide doubled between 1979 and 1987. Urban areas showed no general trend. Any trends present in the levels of low- level ozone are masked by year to year variability.
European Community (Visits)
Mr. Forman : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list (i) the number of visits made by officials in his Department during the past month to destinations outside the United Kingdom but within the European Community on offical business related to the
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European Community, (ii) the number of visits made by officials in his Department to Brussels within the past month on official business related to the European Community and (iii) the number of nights spent by officials in his Department over the past month away from the United Kingdom on official European Community business.Mr. Heseltine : During the past month only one Minister in my Department has made such a visit. It was not to Brussels and entailed one night away from the United Kingdom.
Local Government Finance (Sheffield)
Mr. Bill Michie : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received of late from the Sheffield city council regarding the council tax.
Mr. Key : The Department has received two letters, copies of which were placed in the Library of the House on 14 October 1991.
Standard Spending Assessments
Mr. Colvin : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he intends to make an announcement on next year's standard spending assessments ; and if he will review the formula for calculating standard spending assessments.
Mr. Portillo : My right hon. Friend has now announced his proposals for next year's standard spending assessments. These include changes to some elements of the methodology, following consideration of representations from and discussion with the local authority associations and individual local authorities.
Homelessness
Mr. Fearn : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the grants available for voluntary organisations to help homeless people.
Mr. Yeo : Voluntary organisations concerned with homelessness receive grants under section 73 of the 1985 Housing Act. I have placed in the Library a list of the 99 projects in England which are funded in the current financial year. These are in addition to nearly 70 housing associations and voluntary organisations which are being funded under my Department's rough sleepers initiative.
Water Company Chairmen
Dr. David Clark : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will give financial remuneration in terms of (a) salaries and (b) bonuses for the chairmen of each of the water public limited companies in (i) November 1990 and (ii) November 1991 ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Trippier : This is a matter on which the companies themselves report to their shareholders.
Homosexuality
Mr. Vaz : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many of the representations he has received concerning section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 have been favourable and how many have criticised the section or the way it has worked.
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Mr. Key : Of the 126 representations about section 28 received by my Department since the section came into force, 37 of them were in favour of the section, 75 critical and 14 general queries expressing no preference.
Landfill Gas
Mr. Patrick Thompson : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he intends to publish a revised edition of "Waste Management Paper No. 27" about landfill gas.
Mr. Trippier : The second edition of "Waste Management Paper No. 27" is being published today. This follows public consultation on a draft of the revised paper.
The paper gives guidance on the monitoring and control of landfill gas and its publication follows a Government commitment in the White Paper "This Common Inheritance" to publish detailed guidance on waste disposal techniques. Copies are being sent to the local authorities. The guidance takes into account developments in the Department's research programme on landfill gas. This research is continuing. Information gained from the research programme and developments in landfilling practices will be assessed for further updating of the paper in the future.
Non-domestic Revaluation
Mr. Squire : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what will be the valuation date for the 1995 non-domestic revaluation.
Mr. Heseltine : The next non-domestic property revaluation is due to come into force from 1 April 1995.
I propose that the antecedent date, that is the common valuation date, for the 1995 revaluation will be 1 April 1993 and I will be laying the necessary regulations in due course. My decision will provide certainty for businesses and will allow adequate time for the assessment work to be carried out.
NATIONAL FINANCE
Visible Trade Deficit
1. Mr. Redmond : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the cumulative United Kingdom visible trade deficit since June 1987.
Mr. Mellor : A total of £81 billion.
Taxes and National Insurance
12. Dr. Kim Howells : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his most recent forecast is for the proportion of non-oil gross domestic product that taxes and national insurance contributions will represent in 1991-92.
15. Dr. Kumar : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what proportion of non-oil gross domestic product non-oil taxes and national insurance contributions represented in (a) 1978-79 and (b) 1991-92.
Mr. Maude : 34.7 per cent. and 37.1 per cent. respectively.
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Income Tax
14. Mr. Jessel : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of net tax yield to the Government was drawn from income tax in 1970-71, 1980-81, and 1990-91, respectively.
Mr. Maude : 31 per cent. in 1970-71, 29 per cent. in 1980-81 and 27 per cent. in 1990-91.
22. Mr. Paice : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the current income tax yield from the top 5 per cent. of earners as a proportion of the total ; and what was the equivalent figure in 1979.
Mr. Maude : It is estimated that in 1991-92 the top 5 per cent. of taxpayers will be liable to pay about 32 per cent. of the total yield of income tax. The corresponding figure for 1978-79 was 24 per cent.
Japanese Investment
16. Mr. William Powell : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what proportion of Japanese investment into the European Community came to the United Kingdom in the latest year for which figures are available.
Mr. Mellor : The latest information published by the Bank of Japan indicates that in 1990 just over half of Japanese direct investment in the European Community came to the United Kingdom.
Corporation Tax
17. Mr. Ward : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the level of corporation tax for small companies ; and what was the comparable figure 12 years ago.
Mr. Maude : The small companies rate of corporation tax is 25 per cent. compared with 42 per cent. at the time of the 1979 general election.
Balance of Payments
18. Mr. Patchett : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the latest forecast for the balance of payments deficit in 1992.
Mr. Mellor : In his autumn statement the Chancellor published a forecast for the current account deficit of £9 billion in 1992.
Economic Revival
19. Mr. Winnick : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what representations he has received over measures to revive the economy.
Mr. Mellor : A number. Many of them support the Government's determination to defeat inflation and thereby create the conditions for sustainable economic growth.
Manufacturing Investment
20. Mr. Alan W. Williams : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what was the average annual rate of manufacturing investment between 1974 and 1979 ; and what it has been since 1979.
Mr. Mellor : I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave earlier today to the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. McKay).
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Economic and Monetary Union
21. Mr. Andrew Welsh : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what recent discussions he has had with his European Community counterparts on the progress in reaching an agreement on the draft treaty on economic and monetary union.
Mr. Norman Lamont : I attended the latest meeting of the intergovernmental conference on economic and monetary union on Monday 25 November. I shall attend a further meeting during the weekend of 30 November to 2 December.
Unemployment
23. Mr. Bidwell : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the effects of the Government's economic policies on employment over the last year.
24. Mr. Grocott : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what effects the Government's economic policies have had on the level of unemployment over the last year.
Mr. Mellor : Such effects are not measurable. The Government's economic policies aim to foster sustainable growth of output and employment.
TESSAs
Mr. French : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, further to his answer to the hon. Member for Gloucester, 13 November, Official Report, column 526, if he will review the operation of the TESSA regulations in the light of evidence that some banks and building societies presently refuse to accept TESSAs transferred from other issuers.
Mr. Maude : The TESSA rules are kept under regular review. The number of institutions unwilling so far to accept inward transfers amounts to a very small minority out of a total of 150 providers--and, of those, one has already changed its mind.
EC Meetings
Mr. Sillars : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list the EC Ministerial Council meetings at which his Department has, or will be, represented during November and December.
Mr. Norman Lamont : I attended the meeting of the Council of Economic and Finance Ministers on 11 November and will attend further meetings of that Council on 3 and 16 December. My hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury attended the meeting of the Budget Council on 12 November. In addition, I have attended, and will continue to attend, meetings of the intergovernmental conference on economic and monetary union.
EC (Visits)
Mr. Forman : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list (i) the number of visits made by officials in his Department during the past month to destinations outside the United Kingdom but within the European Community on official business related to the European Community,
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(ii) the number of visits made by officials in his Department to Brussels within the past month on official business related to the European Community and (iii) the number of nights spent by officials in his Department over the past month away from the United Kingdom on official European Community business.Mrs. Gillian Shephard : Officials in my Department made 58 visits in the month of October to destinations outside the United Kingdom but within the European Community on official EC business ; of these visits 46 were to Brussels. Officials spent 76 nights away from the United Kingdom on official EC business in October.
MIRAS
Mr. Maxton : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the estimated value of MIRAS in Scotland in (a) 1990-91 and (b) 1991-92.
Mr. Maude : Broad estimates based on the regional distribution of mortgage interest relief from an analysis of the family expenditure survey are as follows :
Cost of mortgage interest
relief for home owners in
Scotland
|£ million
------------------------------
1990-91 |530
1991-92 |420
The percentages of mortgage interest relief given at source through the MIRAS system are estimated at 87 per cent. for 1990-91 and 94 per cent. for 1991-92.
EDUCATION AND SCIENCE
Investment
Mr. Warren : To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science under what conditions agencies or authorities responsible to his Department have the right to invest funds surplus to their current requirements.
Mr. Eggar : Bodies which receive grant from the Department are generally responsible for their own decisions about the management of any funds they may be holding.
Science Budget
Mr. Butler : To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what percentage increase there will have been in real terms between the United Kingdom science budget of 1978-79 and 1992-93.
Mr. Alan Howarth : Based on actual expenditure and provision, the science budget in 1992-93 will be 31.8 per cent. higher in real terms than it was in 1978-79. However, after making appropriate adjustments for certain transfers of funding responsibilities since 1978-79, including the proposed change in the dual-support arrangements, the increase will be 23.7 per cent.
Capital Spending
Mr. Fatchett : To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will set out by local education authority (a) the bids for capital spending on further education and (b) the capital allocations for further education for 1988-89, 1989-90 and 1990-91, respectively.
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Mr. Fallon : This information could not be provided without disproportionate cost.
Standard Assessment Tests
Mr. Straw : To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science (1) if he will publish information relating to the aggregate results in the standard assessment tests for key stage one for each local authority area, adjusted to take account of socio-economic and other factors in the manner of the DES statistical bulletin 13/84 or other similar appropriate manner ;
(2) if he will publish such information as he has available relating to the aggregate results in the standard assessment tests for key stage one by each local authority area, but in such a manner that individual schools may not be identified.
Mr. Eggar : As announced on 7 November at column 206, my right hon. and learned Friend intends to publish shortly the aggregate results of each local education authority in England, together with the national results. Individual schools will not be identified.
Primary Schools
Mr. Fatchett : To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how many primary schools in (a) England and (b) Wales were built before 1900.
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