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Column 276
St. Helens/KnowsleySalford
Sandwell
Sefton
Sheffield
Shropshire
Solihull
South Tyneside
Staffordshire
Stockport
Surrey
Suffolk
Sunderland
Trafford
Wakefield
Walsall
West Sussex
Wiltshire
Wolverhampton
Since 1989 when the scheme started, the Department has spent over £720,000 and 140 practices have benefited. An assessment of the scheme is being undertaken and any decisions about its future will be made in the light of the outcome of the assessment.
Ms Lynne : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what information she has on the number of dentists who offer NHS patients the option of a Denplan care programme as an alternative.
Dr. Mawhinney : None. Private dental treatment is entirely a matter between individual patients and dentists.
Child Migrants
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what is the present level of funding for the Child Migrants Trust ; and what future support is envisaged ;
(2) what action she will take to advise relatives of child migrants of the present locations of persons who left the United Kingdom prior to 1967 ; and if she will make a statement ;
(3) what action she will take to assist child migrants living abroad to receive details of family background and to re-establish United Kingdom family contact.
Mr. Yeo : The Department has no information regarding the location of former child migrants. There are no plans to assist directly. The Department has provided funds to the Child Migrant Trust which provides a record tracing and advisory service. The trust has been awarded a grant of £25,000 for this year. Decisions about future funding will be taken at the appropriate time.
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what dialogue she has undertaken with health departments in (a) Australia, (b) New Zealand and (c) Canada concerning the welfare of United Kingdom child migrants ;
(2) what dialogue she has undertaken with the (a) Australian, (b) New Zealand and (c) Canadian Governments in order to identify and provide support services and advice to United Kingdom child migrants.
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what information she has available identifying the number of child migrants who have located and rejoined their families in the United Kingdom.
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Ambulance Service
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what changes are planned in the pay of the ambulance service in the 1993-94 financial year.
Mr. Sackville : My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State set out in her letter of 12 November 1992 to national health service employing bodies, including NHS trusts, the limits she expected to be applied to pay settlements throughout the NHS in the year from that date, a copy of which was deposited in the Library. In that context, offers of an increase of 1.5 per cent. in pay and allowances for the 1993-94 year have been made for those ambulance personnel whose pay is negotiated centrally. Information is not available about pay settlements for staff on NHS trust-specific terms and conditions.
Drug Prescribing
Mr. Couchman : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what sources, independent of her Department and of the pharmaceutical industry, have been used by the Advisory Committee on National Health Service Drugs since 1985 to obtain advice on the costs of the products considered for inclusion on the selected list or on the impact of their actions on other national health service costs.
Dr. Mawhinney : The Advisory Committee on National Health Service Drugs is an independent body of experts whose members use whatever sources they consider necessary to obtain advice and information for their deliberations.
Mr. Couchman : To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what are the elements of the costs of administering the selected list scheme ;
(2) what has been the cost of the administration of the selected list in each year of its operation ; and what is the estimated cost for 1993-94 and 1994-95.
Dr. Mawhinney : The cost elements of administering the selected list scheme are those incurred in running the Advisory Committee on National Health Service Drugs and of providing departmental administrative support for the Committee. This amounted to £55,000 in 1991-92. Figures for earlier years are not available but the costs have remained constant in real terms since the inception of the scheme in 1985. An increase of around 50 per cent. is forecast for 1993-94 to deal with the extra work of reviewing the 10 new categories of drugs. Costs thereafter are expected to reduce to the earlier levels.
Hepatitis and Dysentry
Mr. Hain : To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many cases of hepatitis and dysentery there have been in England for each year since 1987.
Mr. Sackville : The information is shown in the tables.
Number of cases notified for Viral Hepatitis in England, 1987-1991
|Hepatitis A |Hepatitis B |Non A-Non B |Other/Not Known|Total
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1987 |1,797 |420 |241 |823 |3,281
1988 |3,093 |374 |334 |1,067 |4,868
1989 |5,210 |409 |249 |1,074 |6,942
1990 |7,165 |419 |162 |1,002 |8,748
1991 |7,186 |471 |149 |693 |8,499
Number of cases
notified for
dysentery in England,
1987-91
|Number
---------------------
1987 |3,333
1988 |3,601
1989 |3,162
1990 |2,521
1991 |8,963
Health Authorities
Mr. Milburn : To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will list for each family health services authority the remuneration paid to chief executives and non-executive directors.
Dr. Mawhinney : Chief executives of family health services authorities (FHSAs) are remunerated in range of £33,160 to £60,650 per year according to the size of the FHSA. All non-executive directors are remunerated at the rate of £5,000 per year.
Mr. Milburn : To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will give details of the remuneration paid to chief executives and non-executive directors of district health authorities.
Dr. Mawhinney : Chief executives of district health authorities (DHAs) are remunerated in the range of £41,830 to £69,990 per year according to the size of the DHA. All non-executive directors are remunerated at the rate of £5,000 per year.
Mr. Milburn : To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) if she will list for each family health services authority the names of the chief executives and all non-executive directors ;
(2) if she will list for each district health authority the names of the chief executive and all non-executive directors.
Dr. Mawhinney : This information is not available centrally. The appointment of chief executives to family health services authorities (FHSAs) and district health authorities (DHAs) is not carried out by Ministers, but is a matter for the FHSAs and DHAs themselves. Non-executive directors of FHSAs and DHAs are appointed by the appropriate regional health authority.
AIDS
Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people in the United Kingdom have developed AIDS.
Mr. Sackville : Up to 31 March 1993, 7,341 AIDS cases had been reported.
Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what has been the total Government expenditure on HIV/AIDS medical research ; and if she will provide an estimate of total expenditure from all sources on HIV/AIDS medical research.
Mr. Sackville : The cumulative total of Government funding for AIDS research for the financial years 1986-87 to 1992-93 is £105,239,000. Information about expenditure from non-governmental sources is not available centrally.
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Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what has been the total expenditure from her Department in support of HIV and AIDS counselling, awareness and education programmes.
Mr. Sackville : Between 1985-86 and 1993-94 the Government have allocated £85 million to the development of the national AIDS public education campaign, including the running costs of the national AIDS helpline and related telephone services. The sum of £11.5 million is being made available in 1993-94.
The table shows the Department of Health and health education authority spend for the development of the national HIV and AIDS public education work including the running costs of the national AIDS helpline and related telephone information services. Not shown in the table are the sums spent by other Government Departments on HIV prevention work within their own spheres of interest.
HIV and AIDS public education
|Department of Health|HEA
|(£ million) |(£ million)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1984-85 |Nil |-
1985-86 |0.52 |-
1986-87 |7.60 |-
1987-88 |6.74 |4.47
1988-89 |- |10.00
1989-90 |- |12.00
1990-91 |- |10.00
1991-92 |- |11.00
1992-93 |- |11.225
Since 1989-90 contributions have also been made towards the costs incurred by regional and district health authorities in the development of local HIV prevention activities. Regional AIDS (Control) Act 1987 reports since 1989- 90 record expenditure on local HIV prevention initiatives as follows :
|£ million
------------------------------
1989-90 |13.4
1990-91 |23.4
1991-92 |27.95
Figures for 1992-93 are not yet available though they are expected to reflect a steady increase in the development of district based HIV prevention work.
Figures recording the total spent on all aspects of health promotion are not collected centrally. However, the Government continue to spend more on HIV and AIDS education than on any other single health promotion programme.
Mr. Butcher : To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many United Kingdom citizens are HIV positive.
Mr. Sackville : Up to 31 March 1993, 19,524 reports of persons testing positive for HIV had been received. The true number of infected people will undoubtedly be higher as some will not have been tested.
Immunisation
Ms Primarolo : To ask the Secretary of State for Health what was the percentage uptake of immunisations in each year since 1980 by district health authorities and FHSAs
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for (a) MMR, (b) rubella, (c) under-two diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio and (d) pre-school diphtheria, tetanus and polio and BCG, together with the source of this information.Mr. Sackville : Information on vaccination and immunisation by family health services authority is not available centrally. Figures for the two-year uptake of diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis and polio by district health authority have been published in the Department of Health publication "Vaccination and Immunisation" since 1987-88, copies of which are available in the Library.
Further information could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Ms Primarolo : To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will place in the Library the latest edition of "Vaccination and Immunisation" based on forms KC50, KC50A and KC51.
Mr. Sackville : The latest edition available is for the period 1990- 91, a copy of which is in the Library.
Comfrey
Ms Corston : To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will make a statement indicating the total number of cases in (a) the United Kingdom and (b) the world of human veno-occlusive liver disease attributable directly to comfrey consumption ; and what percentage of the total incidence of this condition these figures represented in the years in which they arose.
Mr. Sackville : This information is not available centrally. However, table 15, pages 184-191, of the World Health Organisation's "Environmental Health Criteria 80", 1988, lists cases of pyrrolizidine alkaloid poisoning and human reports of veno-occlusive disease from the United Kingdom and many other countries. All these cases are linked to the consumption of plants, including comfrey, which contain the toxic pyrrolizidine alkaloids. The Committee on the Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment, in its recent statement on the safety-in-use of comfrey, refers to an additional two cases of veno- occlusive disease reported since 1988, one in the USA and one in New Zealand.
Copies of the World Health Organisation publication, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food's analysis of comfrey products, the advice of the Committee on the Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment and the Food Advisory Committee together with a draft information note are available in the Library.
WALES
Forestry Commission
Mr. Alex Carlile : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what plans he has to change the exist and learned Member to the answer given by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland to my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, Moorlands (Mr. Knox) on 30 March 1993, Official Report, column 150.
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Unadopted Sewers
Mr. Alex Carlile : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will make funding available to enable water public limited companies and local authorities to upgrade existing unadoptable sewers to adoptable standards ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Gwilym Jones : Responsibility for uprating unadopted sewers to adoptable standards rests with the owners. Sections 104 and 105 of the Water Industry Act 1991 (as amended) provide an adequate mechanism to allow unadopted sewers to be adopted by the relevant authority and include provision for appeals to the Director General of Water Services in the event that adoption is refused.
Mr. Alex Carlile : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what plans he has to set up and fund a programme of survey work designed to measure the extent of unadopted sewers ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Alex Carlile : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what information he has as to how many households in Wales have unadopted sewers ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Gwilym Jones : This information is not available centrally.
Water Disconnections
Mr. Hain : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will give figures for the number of disconnections of domestic water supply for each year since 1987.
Mr. Gwilym Jones : The information the hon. Member requested is set out in the following table. Separate data for domestic disconnections are not available for 1987-88 and 1988-89. Information on statutory water company disconnections was not collected prior to 1988-89.
Disconnections by water
companies in Wales<1>
|Number
-------------------------
Domestic and non-domestic
<2>1987-88 |2,067
1988-89 |1,249
Domestic disconnections
1989-90 |1,356
1990-91 |1,305
1991-92 |2,951
<3>1992-93 |1,072
<1> Dwr Cymru Cyf,
Chester Waterworks
Company and Wrexham and
East Denbighshire Water
Company.
<2> Excluding Chester
Waterworks Company and
Wrexham and East
Denbighshire Water
Company.
<3> Half year ended 30
September 1992.
Hepatitis and Dysentery
Mr. Hain : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how many cases of hepatitis and dysentery there have been in each year since 1987.
Mr. Gwilym Jones : The numbers of notifications of viral hepatitis and dysentery in Wales in each year since 1987 are shown in the table :
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|Viral hepatitis|Dysentery
----------------------------------------------------------------
1987 |98 |283
1988 |194 |91
1989 |129 |115
1990 |257 |235
1991 |360 |972
1992<1> |481 |676
<1> 1992 data are provisional.
Notes:
Viral hepatitis, which includes all forms of hepatitis, was
notifiable as infective jaundice prior to 1989.
Dysentery includes amoebic and bacillary dysentery.
Source: Office of Population Censuses and Surveys Communicable
Disease Statistics (MB2 series).
Careers Services
Mr. Morgan : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how many careers services organisations of the eight county councils have opted to become (a) part of the nearest training and enterprise council, (b) free- standing organisations, (c) partnership organisations and (d) other ; and if he will make a statement.
Sir Wyn Roberts : Voluntary partnerships between training and enterprise councils and the careers services of local education authorities have been established in all Welsh counties. We shall be looking closely at the progress of these partnerships before deciding on what arrangements might apply in the future, as a result of legislation proposed in the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill.
Local Government Finance
Mr. Roger Evans : To ask the Secretary of State for Wales whether he intends to cap any Welsh authorities for 1993-94 ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. David Hunt : Local authorities in Wales have now set their budgets and council tax for 1993-94. Almost all have budgeted within or very close to the limits implied by the provisional capping criteria I announced last December.
The provisions of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 require me to determine capping principles for a class of authority prior to announcing a decision to cap any authority of that class. In the light of careful consideration of their budgets and all other relevant considerations I have now decided my capping principles for district councils.
The principles I have adopted broadly give effect to the provisional criteria I announced to the House last December with one modification. I have included a de minimis proviso to avoid designation in cases where the reduction which could be secured by capping would be less than £1.50 per band D household. Full details of my principles have, this afternoon, been placed in the Library of the House.
On the basis of these principles I have designated Aberconwy borough council for capping. Its 1993-94 budget is £8,734,695 and I have proposed a cap of £8,566,950. The original council tax for a two adult band D dwelling was £69. The reduction implied by the proposed cap is £8.
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On the basis of all the information currently available to me, I am satisfied that my proposed cap is reasonable and appropriate in all the circumstances of the authority and that the reduction I propose is achievable this year.If Aberconwy wishes to accept the amount proposed, it now has 28 days in which to do so. It can also challenge my proposal within 28 days, suggesting an alternative figure together with reasons for it, and in those circumstances it is open to me to set the final cap at a different level from the one I originally proposed. If Aberconwy does not accept my proposed cap, I will seek the approval of the House for a draft order confirming the cap.
Within 21 days of the final cap having been set, Aberconwy must set a new budget requirement reflecting the cap ; and this will feed through to the council tax. I expect that by the end of June Aberconwy will have calculated a new budget requirement leading to a reduced level of council tax.
I propose shortly to apply to the High Court for leave to seek a judicial review of the council tax calculations made by Gwent county council for 1993-94. If leave is granted by the court, the judicial review could result in the authority making new budget requirement and council tax calculations. For this reason, I do not consider it appropriate to make a decision on my capping principles for county councils until such time as this matter is resolved. However, on the basis of the budgetary information available to me, I see no reason to pursue the matter of designation in respect of the other county councils in Wales.
AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD
Grey Herons
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many grey herons were killed under licence in England and Wales in each year since 1988, to prevent serious damage to fisheries.
Mr. Soames : The information requested is as follows :
|Number
---------------------
1988 |0
1989 |0
1990 |0
1991 |5
1992 |<1>1
1993 |<1>1
<1> Returns of
action taken under
licence still
awaited, so figures
may not be final
totals.
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what advice on non-lethal preventive measures is given to those applying for licences to kill grey herons under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, to prevent serious damage to fisheries.
Mr. Soames : All applicants receive a site visit carried out by the Agricultural Development Advisory Service which advises on the appropriate use of methods to prevent or deter herons from feeding at the site. These can include the use of physical proofing, such as netting over of small ponds, and the use of audible and visual bird scarers, including pyrotechnic devices.
Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many licences were (a) applied
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for and (b) issued under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 to permit the killing of grey herons in England and Wales for each year since 1988, to prevent serious damage to fisheries.
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