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Disabled Persons (Northern Ireland) Act 1989

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what plans he has to bring into effect the remaining parts of the Disabled Persons (Northern Ireland) Act 1989. [7745]

Mr. Moss: None. The requirements of the remaining parts of the Act are, to a very large extent, reflected in the existing arrangements for community care.

Health and Personal Social Services Legislation

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what plans he has to consolidate health and personal social services legislation. [7746]

Mr. Moss: None.

Emergency Provisions Acts

Mr. John Marshall: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what arrangements he has made for the review of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Acts 1991 and 1996. [8326]

Sir Patrick Mayhew: I am pleased to say that Mr. John Rowe QC has accepted by invitation to carry out the annual review of the Acts for a further two years.

EDUCATION AND EMPLOYMENT

Jobseeker's Allowance

Mr. Rooney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if a course of 16 guided learning hours a week funded or part-funded by the Further Education Funding Council is deemed part time under jobseeker's allowance regulations. [7686]

Mr. Forth: Yes.

Mr. Rooney: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if part-time students in receipt of jobseeker's allowance who have paid in excess of £250 in course fees will be deemed to have limited their availability for work. [7687]

Mr. Forth: The Employment Service would normally refer cases such as these to an independent adjudication officer for a decision on the jobseeker's availability for work. It is then a matter for the adjudication officer to decide.

Employment Service

Mr. Blunkett: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if she will publish a breakdown

6 Dec 1996 : Column: 817

of spending in 1996-97 and proposed spending in 1997-98 on the Employment Service, giving the percentage change between the two years. [7472]

Mr. Forth: The following table sets out:

(a) figures for 1996-97 as shown in the 1996 departmental report. They do not reflect in-year changes, which have not yet been settled;
(b) figures for 1997-98 which take account of the plans announced by my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget statement so far as the Employment Service 's programme and capital funding but not its running costs are concerned. This is because the final allocation of running costs as between the Employment Service and the rest of the Department has not yet been settled.

Since the figures do not reflect in-year changes in 1996-97 or the full outcome of the plans for 1997-98 announced in the Budget statement, the figures cannot be directly compared and hence no percentage change is shown.

		£ million (net of VAT)
	1996-97(6)	1997-98
Running costs	910	(7)871
Programme funding	304	353
Capital funding and other administrative costs	87	32
Total	1,301	1,256

(6) Figures for 1996-97 are as shown in the 1996 departmental report. They do not reflect in-year changes, which have not yet been settled.

(7) The figure shown is based on the figure given in the 1996 departmental report, increased by £71 million reflecting the transfer of former receipts from DSS to the ES baseline.

Training and Enterprise Councils

Mr. Blunkett: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if she will list each training or employment scheme run by the training and enterprise councils employment service, giving for each the total budgeted spending for 1996-97 and planned spending for 1997-98 and the percentage change between the two years. [7474]

Mr. Paice: The information requested is in the following table:

Expenditure on DFEE programmes run by training and enterprise councils

	£ millions
	1996-97 expected spend	1997-98 planned spending	percentage change
Training for work	467.173	446.320	-4.5
Work-based training for young people	723.451	745.082	+3.0
Local competitiveness budget	77.350	66.131	-14.5
Performance-related funding(8)	21.455	--	n/a
Jobmatch pilots	1.026	0.270	-73.7
Further education competitiveness and development funds	28.828	26.374	-8.5
Adult guidance	1.327	NIL	-100
Out of school childcare	9.630	4.100	-57.4
Work experience	6.559	10.197	+55.5
TEC discretionary fund	15.000	23.000	+53.3
European structural funds	25.950	27.420	+5.8
TEC strategy budget	100.464	95.000	-5.4
Total	1.478.213	1.443.804	-2.3

(8) Resources for performance-related funding are determined on an annual basis after the PES settlement and will be funded in 1997-8 (as in previous years) out of the resources for the main TEC programmes.

6 Dec 1996 : Column: 818

Mr. Blunkett: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what advice she is giving to training and enterprise councils about the reductions that they should make in the delivery of local training programmes arising from planned reductions in funding for 1997-98. [7475]

Mr. Paice: The Secretary of State wrote to training and enterprise councils on 26 November giving details of plans for TEC programmes in 1997-98. A copy of that letter has been placed in the Library.

Christmas Expenditure

Mr. Donohoe: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how much her Department will spend on Christmas trees and decorations this year; how many Christmas trees will be bought for her Department's headquarters; and what are the type and country of origin of the trees. [7565]

Mr. Robin Squire: A total of 12 Christmas trees will be purchased for DFEE and Employment Service headquarters offices nationally, at a cost of £1,559, including decorations. Details of the type and origin of the trees are as follows: one artificial, made in England; one English pine; eight Norway spruce--six German, two Norwegian--and two Nordman firs from Holland.

HEALTH

Dental Services

Mr. Gordon Prentice: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what has been the largest annual amount paid to a single dentist offering NHS treatments in each year since 1990. [5242]

Mr. Malone: The information is contained in the following table:

The largest amount of general dental service gross fee(9) earnings(10) paid to a single dentist offering national health service treatment in each year since 1991-92(11)

	£
1991-92	395,000
1992-93	486,000
1993-94	661,000
1994-95	617,000
1995-96	604,000

(9) Gross fees payments do not account for all NHS earnings. Other payments such as maternity and seniority payments would have been made in addition to gross fees.

(10) Rounded to the nearest £1,000.

(11) Data before 1991-92 are not available. The new contract in October 1990 resulted in major revisions to information systems.

6 Dec 1996 : Column: 819

Food Poisoning

Mrs. Currie: To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list for each of the past 10 years the number of cases of salmonella poisoning and the number of deaths where salmonellosis is mentioned as a primary or secondary cause. [7357]

Mr. Horam: Information on the number of salmonella isolations and the number of deaths where salmonella was given as an underlying cause is:

Salmonella in humans in England and Wales

Year	Isolations(12)	Deaths
1986	16,976	40
1987	20,532	52
1988	27,478	58
1989	29,998	61
1990	30,112	68
1991	27,693	62
1992	31,355	59
1993	30,650	35
1994	30,411	39
1995	(13)29,717	36

Source:

Deaths--Office for National Statistics.

Isolations--Public Health Laboratory Service.

Notes:

Deaths: figures represent death registrations, except for 1993 and 1994 which represent deaths which occurred in the year. Data from 1993 onwards may not be directly comparable to previous years because of a changeover to an automated coding system.

(12) Source: LEP (formally DEP) data 1985 to 1991. The Public Health Laboratory Service salmonella dataset: 1992 onwards.

(13) Provisional.

Since 1993 all causes of death mentioned on the death certificate are analysed and are presented in the following table:

Deaths in England and Wales with a mention of salmonella infection, by occurrence 1993-95

Year	Deaths(14)
1993	59
1994	63
1995	65

(14) Includes the data where salmonella was presented in the first table as an underlying cause.

Similar information for earlier than 1993 could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

Mrs. Clwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many cases of food poisoning have been linked to the consumption of meat or meat products sold as fresh which were previously frozen. [7362]

Mr. Horam: The information requested is not available.

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