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Croydon Tramlink

Mr. Ottaway: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make a statement on the passenger projections for Croydon Tramlink. [119839]

Mr. Hill: This is a commercial matter for Tramtrack Croydon Ltd., the private sector consortium which holds the concession to build, operate and maintain Croydon Tramlink.

Parliamentary Answers (BNFL)

Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list each of the (a) oral and (b) written parliamentary answers

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Ministers in his Department have provided since May 1997 which were based on (a) information and (b) a draft provided by British Nuclear Fuels. [120044]

Mr. Mullin: Internal advice and the source of such advice is not made public in line with exemption 2 of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information.

Best Value Inspection Regime

Mr. Waterson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list those private sector companies involved in the best value inspection regime. [119990]

Ms Armstrong: No private sector companies are yet involved in carrying out best value inspections. However, both the Audit Commission and some of the other Inspectorates intend to use teams which include staff with private sector experience, either on secondment or as consultants. The Audit Commission are also in discussion with a number of potential private sector providers with a view to their use on future occasions.

Departmental Initiatives

Mr. Don Foster: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list the number and value of (a) bids for and (b) grants made in each of the last three financial years for which figures are available, for each (i) area-based and (ii) other regeneration-related initiative for which his Department is responsible. [119798]

Ms Beverley Hughes: The information requested is not held centrally and could not be collected in the time available. I will write shortly with the information to the hon. Member.

Mr. Don Foster: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list for each (a) area-based and (b) other regeneration-related initiative for which his Department is responsible (i) the amount budgeted and (ii) the total expended in each financial year for the planned lifetime of each initiative. [119793]

Ms Beverley Hughes: Expenditure since 1997 and the amounts budgeted for this financial year and for 2001-02, for the area-based and other regeneration-related initiatives for which my Department is responsible are set out as follows. The level of funding for each of these initiatives beyond March 2002 is being considered in the current spending review. Information on planned budgets and the total expenditure in previous years for other regeneration programmes may be found in the departmental Annual Report.

£ million

(i) Amount budgeted	2000-01	2001-02
Area-based initiatives
Single Regeneration Budget	813.8	878.5
New Deal for Communities	120.7	450.0
Other regeneration-related initiatives
European Regional Development Fund	286.2	231.2
Coalfields Regeneration Trust	20.6	18.2

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£ million

(ii) Total expenditure	1997-98	1998-99	1999-2000(9)
Area-based initiatives
Single Regeneration Budget	458.8	560.9	679.1
New Deal for Communities	--	0.2	48.5
Other regeneration-related initiatives
European Regional Development Fund	191.5	229.4	336.2
Coalfields Regeneration Trust	--	--	1.0

(9) Provisional outturn

Severance Payments

Dr. Gibson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make a statement on his policy relating to monitoring severance payments made to council officials. [119859]

Ms Beverley Hughes: The Local Government (Discretionary Payments)(Amendment) Regulations 1999 introduced provisions which require local authorities in England and Wales to formulate and publish a written statement of their policy in connection with the exercise of their discretion to pay compensation, including severance payments, under parts II, III and IV of the Local Government (Discretionary Payments) Regulations 1996.

The 1999 regulations require each employing authority to be satisfied that their policy is workable, affordable and reasonable having regard to the foreseeable costs. In that way, elected members have direct responsibility for the decisions taken within the terms of their published policy statement and are locally and legally accountable for them to local council taxpayers and to the District Auditor.

My Department does not monitor individual severance payments made by local authorities, nor would it be appropriate to intervene in the way such authorities exercise these statutory functions. We do, however, remain in close touch with the Audit Commission, the Employers' Organisation and other interested parties on the continuing effectiveness of these regulations.

High Hedges

Mr. Green: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions how many submissions he received in response to the consultation paper on high hedges; and if he will make a statement. [119861]

Mr. Mullin: We have received some 3,000 responses to this consultation, which we are currently analysing. We hope to make a statement, setting out our decisions on the way forward on this issue, and the reasons for them, by the summer.

Rough Sleeping

Mr. Lansley: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what the Government have done to implement the findings of reports of the Social Exclusion Unit on rough sleeping. [119976]

Ms Armstrong: Following the publication of the Social Exclusion Unit report, the Rough Sleepers Unit was established in April 1999 to deliver the Prime

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Minister's target of reducing rough sleeping by two-thirds by 2002. On 15 December 1999 the Government published their strategy on rough sleeping, "Coming in from the Cold", which set out in detail how we intend to meet the target. The Rough Sleepers Unit is working across Whitehall and beyond to implement the strategy and reduce rough sleeping.

Water Abstraction

Mr. Burgon: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what scope he plans for the use of economic instruments in relation to water abstraction. [120589]

Mr. Meacher: Within the next two weeks, my Department will publish "Economic Instruments in Relation to Water Abstraction: a consultation paper". Copies will be placed in the Library of the House on the day of publication. The paper will say that the Government take the view that economic instruments may be applied to water abstraction in the following way:

(a) abstraction charges should remain limited to recovery of the Environment Agency's water resources management costs, but should be increased to the extent necessary to meet licence curtailment compensation costs when, but not before, these are incurred, thereby providing incentive for low-value users of water to reduce their licences voluntarily;
(b) trading in licences should be encouraged in such a way that it delivers environmental benefits together with economic gains, within the regulatory requirements of the abstraction licensing system as it will be following the changes which the Government announced on 31 March 1999, Official Report, column 756-57, and which it will bring forward in a forthcoming Water Bill;
(c) the Environment Agency should actively encourage abstraction licence trading with a general presumption that trading may be possible in most areas, and in particular by:

ensuring that its licensing administrative processes operate speedily and efficiently, making full use of e-mail and other electronic means;

clearly identifying, within its Abstraction Management Strategies, the scope for trading and any unavoidable limitations to particular types of trades;

establishing an Internet site on which prospective buyers and sellers can record their interest in trading; and by

requiring trading prices and other details of completed trades to be placed on the same Internet site.

The Government will consider this view further in the light of responses to the consultation paper and will announce their firm intentions in due course.

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