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Department and |Number of posts
Location
---------------------------------------------------
Inland Revenue
Nottingham |700
Washington |20
Cardiff |300
Wrexham |20
Sunderland |199
Bootle |204
Livingstone |20
Salford |269
Glasgow |34
East Kilbride |220
Middlesbrough |199
Edinburgh |60
Customs and Excise
Manchester |262
Liverpool |360
Southend |198
CSO
Newport, Wales |41
Treasury
Basingstoke |8
During the previous five years, 278 posts from the Chancellor's departments were relocated from London. They were all moved by the Inland Revenue on their own initiative and the locations and number of posts involved were as follows :
Location |Number of posts ------------------------------------------------ Bristol |38 Solihull |67 Leeds |67 Birkenhead |24 Manchester |65 Glasgow |17
Economy
Mr. David Young : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what discussions he has had with industry on the current state of the economy.
Mr. Portillo : My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and I have frequent contact with representatives of industry, and pay close attention to their views on the economy. I have taken careful note of their concerns and proposals, and the broad welcome given to the autumn statement.
Third World Debt
Mr. Meacher : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much has been granted in tax relief to United Kingdom banks against possible default on third world debts in each of the last 10 years.
Mr. Dorrell : Provisions for doubtful sovereign debt by banks operating in the United Kingdom are estimated to have reduced corporation tax receipts in the last six years by the following amounts :
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|£ million
-------------------------------
1986-87 |70
1987-88 |240
1988-89 |550
1989-90 |480
1990-91 |720
<1>1991-92 |190
<1> provisional
Estimates for earlier years are zero or small.
Public expenditure
Mr. Jenkin : To ask the Chancellor of the exchequer if he will make a statement on the reasons underlying the policy of seeking to reduce United Kingdom public expenditure as a proportion of national income.
Mr. Portillo : It is important, as the economy recovers, to reduce public expenditure as a share of national income so as to ensure that the benefits of recovery are not pre-empted by the state. A constantly increasing proportion would impose an intolerable burden on the wealth- creating sector and choke off growth. We need to reduce over time the ratio of public spending to gross domestic product so as to achieve our aim of returning the budget to balance as the economy recovers.
Mr. David Porter : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what weight is given to service-specific costs such as health care and medical inflation, education inflation and social service provision inflation in calculating public spending by Departments ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Portillo : The Government do not plan public expenditure in volume terms. However, service-specific costs are one of the many factors taken into account when determining the allocation of the public expenditure total between programmes.
Share Ownership
Ms. Harman : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will provide a breakdown of share ownership by occupational status for the most recent date available.
Mr. Dorrell : The 1992 Treasury-ProShare share ownership survey showed that 22 per cent. of the adult population in Great Britain owned shares. Of these shareholders, 45 per cent. were in full-time employment ; 10 per cent. were in part-time employment ; 2 per cent. were students ; 5 per cent. were retired ; and 37 per cent. were inactive or unemployed.
Sellafield
Mr. Gale : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what meetings he and his Ministers and officials have had during the past 12 months with (a) Greenpeace and (b) other anti-nuclear groups to discuss the future of the thermal oxide reprocessing plant at Sellafield.
Sir John Cope : Following a request from Greenpeace for a meeting to discuss the economics of nuclear fuel reprocessing, Treasury officials met representatives from Greenpeace in September 1992. There have been no meetings with other anti-nuclear groups in the last 12 months.
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Pensions (Tax Relief)
Mr. Dewar : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what would be the cost in 1993-94 of removing tax relief at the higher rate from (a) personal pensions, (b) all forms of occupational pensions and (c) all pensions to which higher rate tax exemption applies.
Mr. Dorrell [holding answer 4 December 1992] : The latest estimates of the direct revenue yields for 1993-94, assuming statutory indexation of 3.25 per cent. on 1992-93 levels of allowances and thresholds, are as follows :
|£ million
----------------------------------------------------------------
Withdrawal of higher rate relief:-
on contributions to personal pensions<1> |180
on contributions to occupational pensions |300
on all pensions |480
<1> Including relief for retirement annuity premia and free
standing additional voluntary contributions.
No account has been taken of possible behavioural changes resulting from restricting availability of relief at the higher rate in these ways.
Appointments
Mr. Milburn : To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he plans to announce the appointment of a team of independent forecasters to assist the Treasury ; and if he will name the individuals he has approached to date.
Mr. Nelson [holding answer 1 December 1992] : Pursuant to my reply of 3 December 1992, Official Report, column 306, I have now invited the following to become members of the panel :
Andrew Britton, Esq., National Institute of Economic and Social Research.
Professor Tim Congdon, Lombard Street Research.
Professor David Currie, London Business School.
Gavyn Davies, Esq., Goldman Sachs International Ltd.
Professor Wynne Godley, Cambridge University.
Professor Patrick Minford, Liverpool University.
Andrew Sentance, Esq., Confederation of British Industry.
ENVIRONMENT
Common Land
Mr. Dafis : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will seek to introduce new legislation on common land in England and Wales.
Mr. Maclean : Our policy on common land in England and Wales was set out in the statement made by the then Minister for the Environment and Countryside on 26 July 1990, at columns 391-92, but I cannot say when Commons legislation will be promoted to implement that policy.
Energy Efficiency
Mr. Jon Owen Jones : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much investment he is making in programmes for energy efficiency, energy conservation and combined heat and power programmes in the current year.
Mr. MacLean : The Energy Efficiency Office encourages energy efficiency through a range of initiatives, for which
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the budget for 1992-93 is £63 million. The promotion of combined heat and power is an integral part of the best practice programme which is one of these initiatives.Civil Servants
Mr. Raymond S. Robertson : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many civil servants from his Department have been relocated from London to other parts of the United Kingdom (a) in the last five years and (b) in the last 10 years ; and to where they were relocated.
Mr. Howard : Over the past five years my Department has relocated 174 posts from London to Bedford, Bristol, Leeds and Manchester. Although records are not available for earlier years, it would appear that no posts were relocated during the five years prior to 1988. Overall some 45 per cent. of my Department's staff now work outside London. The need to retain posts in London is kept under review and we shall continue to look for opportunities to move posts to other parts of the country in accordance with Government policy.
Homelessness
Ms. Walley : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will meet the Churches National Housing Coalition to discuss its petition on the growth and persistence of homelessness.
Mr. Baldry : I addressed a meeting organised by the Churches National Housing Coalition as part of its lobby of Parliament on 1 December 1992, and I listened with interest to the concerns expressed.
Council Tax
Ms. Janet Anderson : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will estimate the income to be raised from the council tax in respect of (a) hospices and (b) other residential care homes, nationally and broken down by county authority area ; and what representations he has received upon the council tax liability of (i) hospices and (ii) other residential care homes.
Mr. Robin Squire : There are about 16,000 residential care homes in England, and some 3,500 nursing homes, including hospices. My Department does not hold information on the bands to which each home will be allocated. Nor do we know the levels of discounts, reductions for disabilities and transitional relief to which each will be entitled. Furthermore, as local authorities will not be setting their council taxes until the spring, it is impossible to estimate the amount of tax which will be payable.
My Department has received a number of representations about the council tax from individual care and nursing homes, and from associations representing such homes.
Local Government Superannuation Scheme
Mr. Jon Owen Jones : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will postpone the implementation of the local government superannuation scheme until after the results of the Goode inquiry have been made public ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Robin Squire : The recommendations of the Pension Law Review Committee will be considered carefully when
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they are published. If changes to the regulations governing the local government superannuation scheme become necessary, statutory consultations with the interested parties will take place. Meantime, amendments to the scheme will continue.Council Reallocation Grants
Mr. Ron Davies : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many council reallocation grants were paid to people in (a) London and (b) England, wishing to move to Wales, in each year since 1989 ; and what was the cost to his Department in each of these years.
Mr. Baldry : Section 129 of the Housing Act 1988 empowers local authorities to give grants to their tenants to help them obtain other accommodation by buying or leasing a home or by extending an existing property.
Reports on the operation of cash incentive schemes in 1989-90 and 1990-91, based on returns from local authorities, have already been placed in the Library and include the information requested. In 1991-92, a total of 22 grants were paid to tenants in London who wished to move to Wales and 12 to tenants in the rest of England who also wished to move to Wales. Information on the actual cost of the 34 grants in question is not readily available, but the average grant paid nationally in 1991-92 was £16,496.
Sellafield
Mr. Gale : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what work has been undertaken by his Department to assess the economic implications of a delay in commissioning the thermal oxide reprocessing plant at Sellafield.
Mr. Maclean : None. Consultation has already begun on the necessary draft authorisation for the Sellafield site to cover THORP operation.
Mr. Gale : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what meetings he and his Ministers and officials have had during the last 12 months with (a) Greenpeace and (b) other anti-nuclear groups to discuss the commissioning of the thermal oxide reprocessing plant at Sellafield.
Mr. Maclean : My right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State met members of Greenpeace on 21 September and discussed a number of issues including the commissioning of the thermal oxide reprocessing plant at Sellafield.
Derelict Land Grant
Mr. Frank Field : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much derelict land grant expenditure there has been in the metropolitan borough of Wirral council district in each year since 1984 (a) at current prices and (b) at 1984 prices.
Mr. Robin Squire [holding answer 4 December 1992] : The information requested is as follows :
|c|Metropolitan Borough of Wirral: Derelict Land Grant
Expenditure|c|
|1992 |1984
[NL] |Expenditure|Prices
[NL] |£ |£
------------------------------------------------------------
1984-85 |191,533 |290,307 |191,533
1985-86 |213,122 |319,329 |202,091
1986-87 |303,962 |441,240 |279,244
1987-88 |187,922 |258,580 |163,646
1988-89 |559,000 |716,985 |453,751
1989-90 |175,000 |210,613 |133,289
1990-91 |371,841 |414,428 |262,278
1991-92 |351,419 |366,354 |231,852
<1>1992-93 |400,000 |400,000 |253,144
|------- |------- |-------
Total |2.753,799 |3,417,836 |2,170,828
<1> Forecast
A further £102,000 derelict land grant was paid in this period towards reclamation schemes carried out by non-local authority applicants in the metropolitan borough of Wirral.
Empty Properties
Mr. Frank Field : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will break down into local authority areas the distribution of the £750 million budget announced in the autumn statement for the purchase of empty houses.
Sir George Young [holding answer 4 December 1992] : Of the £750 million package, £627 million is being spent in England. A total of £577 million has been allocated to the Housing Corporation for the purchase of empty, new and repossessed properties and £20 million for additional grants under the tenants incentive schemes--TIS. A total of £30 million is being allocated to local authorities for additional grants under the cash incentive scheme--CIS.
The resources for the purchase of empty properties are being allocated by the corporation to housing associations operating in a number of local authority areas. Around 75 per cent. of the money has now been allocated ; the remainder will be allocated by early January. The distribution of the resources allocated so far is as follows :
|£ million
----------------------------------------------------------
London and Home Counties (North East) |68.60
London and Home Counties (North West) |62.60
London and Home Counties (South) |84.33
West |59.20
East Midlands |42.10
West Midlands |34.20
North East |37.40
North West |31.40
Merseyside |6.80
The £20 million for additional TIS grants has been allocated by the corporation to its regions as follows :
|£ million
----------------------------------------------------------
London and Home Counties (North East) |2.914
London and Home Cunties (North West) |3.735
London and Home Conties (South) |4.161
West |2.434
East Midlands |1.466
West Midlands |2.072
North East |1.326
North West |1.506
Merseyside |0.376
The £30 million for additional CIS grants will be spent in London and the south-east. Allocations to individual local authorities will be announced shortly.
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Tarmac
Mr. Henderson : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what was the amount of the claim for liquidated damages made by the Property Services Agency Projects board against Tarmac in respect of the contract on the Hewell Grange prison in Leeds.
Mr. Redwood [holding answer 4 December 1992] : The amount of any such claim is commercially confidential. The contract on Hewell Grange prison was excluded from the sale of PSA Projects to Tarmac. Any claims are the responsibility of the Home Office, as the client.
EDUCATION
Higher Education
Mr. Rooker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will publish an updated version of the table in annex 2 of "Higher Education : A New Framework", Cm 1541, setting out projections of home student numbers in higher education in Great Britain.
Mr. Forman : The public expenditure proposals announced in the autumn statement provide for a 13 per cent. increase in the number of full- time equivalent home and EC students in higher education in England over the next three years. The figures are :
|Number
------------------------
1992-93 |776,000
1994-95 |877,000
1995-96 |880,000
The figures assume that the proportion of young people entering higher education--currently well over one in four--will remain broadly steady over the next three years, and that it will increase to one in three by the end of the decade--the level projected in the 1991 White Paper.
Mandatory Awards
Mr. Rooker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education how many investigations have been made by his Department into reports of delays in payment of mandatory awards ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Forman : The Department has investigated complaints of delays made against seven local education authorities in the current academic year.
Students (Sponsorship)
Mr. Rooker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will call for a report on how institutions of higher and further education are reacting to the withdrawing of financial sponsorship from students by industrial and commercial sponsors.
Mr. Forman : Industry and commerce will decide questions of student sponsorship in the context of their overall recruitment policies. It is for individual higher and further education institutions themselves to consider whether changes in the financial sponsorship of students have any implications for the particular mix and type of
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courses they provide. Any withdrawing of sponsorship by industry and commerce will not however affect a student's entitlement to a mandatory award or student loan.Discipline
Rev. Martin Smyth : To ask the Secretary of State for Education what role his Department has in any disciplinary proceedings in locally or directly managed schools.
Mr. Forth : Disciplinary procedures applying to staff in local education authority-maintained schools without delegated budgets are the responsibility of the local education authority ; in schools with delegated budgets and grant-maintained schools, they are under the control of the governing body.
Open University
Mr. Rooker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will make a statement outlining what action he has taken in respect of the final report of the visiting committee of the Open university.
Mr. Forman : My right hon. Friend decided, on the advice of the chairman of the Open university visiting committee, that the report should be passed to the Higher Education Funding Council for England, since that body would be responsible for the Open university's funding from April 1993. A copy of the report was sent to the chairman of the funding council on 21 August.
Mr. Rooker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education how much financial provision he has made available in the current year to the Open university to assist students in financial hardship.
Mr. Forman : The practice of earmarking a portion of the Open university's recurrent grant for the provision of financial support for unemployed students was discontinued in 1991 at the university's request. The university is now free to determine how much of its grant it spends on assistance for students suffering financial hardship.
EC Education Council
Mr. Pawsey : To ask the Secretary of State for Education what was the outcome of the recent meeting of the Council of EC Ministers of Education.
Mr. Patten : I chaired the meeting on Friday 27 November of the Council of EC Education Ministers. The Under-Secretary of State for Further and Higher Education and the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland represented the United Kingdom.
After two and a half years of negotiation, the Ministers reached agreement on the terms of the new statute of the European schools. The effect of this will be to improve the efficiency of operation of the board of governors of these nine schools, which were established for the children of the staff of the EC institutions.
The Ministers also agreed that there should be a second four-year phase of the TEMPUS programme and exchanged views on its key features. TEMPUS is a programme of EC assistance to the countries of central and eastern Europe through co-operation in higher education. The first phase expires after the academic year 1993-94 and it should now be possible for the Council formally to adopt the second phase early next year.
Column 477
The Ministers adopted conclusions on and discussed the future directions of co-operation at Community level in higher education and in open and distance learning. They adopted conclusions on EC-United States co-operation in education and training, health education in schools and the Eurydice network of information exchange in education.School Closures
Mrs. Dunwoody : To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will outline the criteria for the closure of rural schools.
Mr. Forth : My right hon. Friend would expect any closure proposal to take account of considerations such as the number of pupils on roll, the quality of alternative provision, parental choice, local geography, the distance to be travelled to alternative schools, and the age of children making those journeys. That said, very small schools are expensive to run and where alternative schools are readily accessible closures can make sense.
Surplus School Places (Thamesmead)
Mr. Austin-Walker : To ask the Secretary of State for Education what estimate he has made of the number of surplus school places at both primary and secondary level in the Thamesmead area in both Greenwich and Bexley ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Forth : On the basis of the Department's survey of school capacity we estimate that in 1991 the London borough of Greenwich had 3,026 surplus places in the primary sector and 3,756 surplus places in the secondary sector, representing 15 and 22 per cent. of total capacity respectively. The authority has suggested that these figures should be revised to 2,689 primary and 3,796 secondary. It is not possible to say how many of these were located in the Thamesmead area.
A-levels
Mr. Nigel Evans : To ask the Secretary of State for Education what is the current percentage of those students taking GCSEs who go on to take A-levels.
Mr. Forman : About 40 per cent. of pupils who take GCSEs at 16 go on to study for A-levels at schools and publicly funded further education establishments.
HOME DEPARTMENT
Public Interest Immunity Certificates
Mr. Winnick : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will introduce legislation to amend the law regarding public interest immunity certificates.
Mr. Jack : There are no current plans for legislation. However, the issue is within the scope of both Lord Justice Scott's inquiry and the Royal Commission on criminal justice ; and we shall study carefully any recommendations that are made.
Police Pension Scheme
Mr. Michael : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will take the necessary legislative and other steps to provide that the police pension scheme
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shall provide a pension for the widow of a policeman who married after retirement from the police force but before 6 April 1978 as if the requirements of the Social Security Act 1975 applied prior to that date.Mr. Charles Wardle : No. The police pension scheme is consistent with other main public service pension schemes on this matter. There is no justification for making an exception.
Teenage Prisoners
Mr. Michael : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) 16-year-olds, (b) 15-year-olds and (c) 14-year-olds have been held in an adult prison on remand for any period of time during each of the last five years.
Mr. Peter Lloyd : The readily available information is given in the table. Separate figures for adult prisons are not readily available.
|c|Receptions of untried and convicted unsentenced juveniles into
local|c|
|c|prisons and remand centres in England and Wales: by type of
initial|c|
|c|reception and age, 1987-91|c|
Type of reception Number of persons
and age
|1987 |1988 |1989 |1990 |1991<1>
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Untried
14 |2 |1 |- |3 |10
15 |545 |510 |443 |359 |401
16 |1,162 |994 |935 |800 |673
Convicted unsentenced
14 |1 |- |- |- |1
15 |38 |25 |25 |22 |29
16 |117 |91 |63 |84 |55
<1> Provisional figures.
Prison Service (Director General)
Mr. Alex Carlile : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement regarding the appointment of a new director general of the prison service.
Mr. Kenneth Clarke : I hope to be able to make an announcement shortly.
Devon and Cornwall Police Authority
Mr. Tyler : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what increases in uniformed officers have been approved for the Devon and Cornwall police authority for 1991-92, 1992-93 and 1993-94 ; what were the requests of the authority ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Charles Wardle : The information is given in the table.
Year |Applications (Number|Posts approved
|of posts)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1991-92 |31 |15
1992-93 |70 |48
1993-94 |49 |Nil
In the light of the Government's decision that constraints must be placed upon public expenditure, my
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right hon. and learned Friend has concluded that the costs of additional police officers cannot at present be justified. He has therefore decided not to approve any increases in police establishments for 1993-94.Immigration Ministers' Meeting
Sir John Wheeler : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement about the meeting of European Community Immigration and Trevi Ministers which he chaired in London on 30 November and 1 December.
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