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TRADE AND INDUSTRY
London Weighting
Mr. Weir: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will estimate the total value of London weightings and London living allowances for her Department; and if she will make a statement. [6836]
Ms Hewitt: The Department of Trade and Industry consolidated London weighting and local pay additions into base pay in 1997. Since then, it has paid staff in London at a higher rate than equivalent staff in the National area through the use of separate pay ranges.
Departmental Properties
Mr. Weir: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will estimate the total running costs for buildings used, owned or rented by her Department for each nation and region of the UK, and estimate the average cost per square metre for properties used by her Department as a whole, and by region and nation of the UK. [6837]
Ms Hewitt: The estimated Running costs for Department of Trade and Industry properties in the United Kingdom for the financial year 2001–02 are shown in the table.
15 Oct 2001 : Column: 979W
| Area/m(54) | Total running cost (£) | Cost (£)/m(54) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nation | |||
| England | 101,014.65 | 50,381,200.00 | 498.75 |
| Scotland | 11,993.00 | 1,524,000.00 | 127.07 |
| Wales | 3,359.00 | 211,000.00 | 62.82 |
| Northern Ireland | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Total UK | 116,366.65 | 52,116,200.00 | 447.86 |
| English regions | |||
| North East | 1,330.65 | 136,200.00 | 102.21 |
| North West | 309.00 | 82,000.00 | 265.37 |
| Yorkshire and Humber | 2,016.00 | 401,000.00 | 198.91 |
| East Midlands | 213.00 | 54,000.00 | 253.52 |
| West Midlands | 1,349.00 | 389,000.00 | 288.36 |
| East | 1,316.00 | 220,000.00 | 167.17 |
| South East | 701.00 | 249,000.00 | 355.21 |
| South West | 190.00 | 13,000.00 | 68.42 |
| London | 93,590.00 | 48,837,000.00 | 521.82 |
| Total regions | 101,014.65 | 50,381,200.00 | 498.75 |
Note:
Total running costs exclude VAT
Ms Walley: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what (a) building and (b) refurbishment projects are planned by her Department in (i) the current year and (ii) the next financial year; and what the costs will be of each project. [6592]
Ms Hewitt: The Department has two projects exceeding £1,000,000.
The extension of the Conference Centre in 1 Victoria Street is forecast to cost £3,191,000. The expenditure is spread over three financial years.
| Year | £ |
|---|---|
| 2000–01 | 416,000 |
| 2001–02 | 2,709,000 |
| 2002–03 | 66,000 |
Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will list the number, value and location of properties newly leased in each of the last five years by her Department, broken down by leases by the Department itself, its next step agencies and its non-departmental public bodies, differentiating between purchases made as a result of the creation of new bodies and those purchases made by established bodies. [7820]
Nigel Griffiths: This information is not held centrally and to obtain this information would exceed the disproportionate cost threshold.
The PFI project to provide serviced accommodation for the National Physical Laboratory at Teddington involves a capital cost to the PFI contractor of £82,000,000.
Xinjiang-Shanghai Pipeline
Norman Baker: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps she is taking to encourage the Chinese authorities to undertake social and environmental impact assessments in connection with the proposed west-east pipeline from Xinjiang to Shanghai. [7085]
Nigel Griffiths: We take advantage of every relevant Ministerial visit, both inward and outward, to encourage the Chinese Government to take the social and
15 Oct 2001 : Column: 980W
environmental aspects of any major project into account. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Sport highlighted this in connection with the proposed West-East pipeline project, to the Vice Chairmen of both the State Development and Planning Commission and State Economic and Trade Commission when he was in China in February.
My right hon. Friend the Minister for Industry and Energy, will stress the importance of the issue when he visits China later this month.
Export Licences
Mr. Brady: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many export licence applications have taken (a) up to one month, (b) two to three months, (c) three to six months and (d) over six months to decide in each of the last five years. [7210]
Nigel Griffiths: On 1 March 1999 a new IT system named ELATE was introduced to process Standard Individual Export Licence (SIEL) applications in the DTI's Export Control Organisation (ECO). Data can therefore be given in the form requested from March 1999 and are included in the table. Prior to that date information on SIELs was not stored in a format which allows us to retrieve the data without incurring disproportionate cost.
It would also entail disproportionate cost to provide the appropriate statistics for Open Individual Export Licence (OIEL) applications.
Details of licensing performance against published Government targets have been outlined in the Government's Annual Reports on Strategic Export Controls since 1997. These can be accessed via the Foreign Office web-site at www.fco.gov.uk.
| Year | Processed in: (working days) | Number of SIELs | Per cent. of SIELs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1999(54) | 0–20 | 5,077 | 65.7 |
| 21–60 | 2,443 | 31.6 | |
| 61–120 | 197 | 2.5 | |
| Over 120 | 9 | 0.1 | |
| 2000(55) | 0–20 | 6,342 | 59.9 |
| 21–60 | 3,381 | 31.9 | |
| 61–120 | 607 | 5.7 | |
| Over 120 | 259 | 2.4 | |
| 2001(56) | 0–20 | 4,722 | 60.0 |
| 21–60 | 2,364 | 30.0 | |
| 61–120 | 484 | 6.2 | |
| Over 120 | 299 | 3.8 |
(53) Figures include all cases—both those circulated and not circulated by DTI to our advisory departments.
(54) 1 March to 31 December
(55) 1 January to 31 December
(56) 1 January to 26 September
Note:
In June 2000 a change in the criteria for circulating cases meant that nearly all cases would, from that point, be circulated. The figures given do not therefore match those in the Annual Reports on Strategic Export Controls because figures given in those reports made a distinction between circulated and non-circulated cases.
15 Oct 2001 : Column: 981W
Mr. Luff: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps she has taken to ensure that advice and assistance given to exporters to (a) Pakistan and (b) China is consistent with the requirements of export licences; and if she will make a statement. [6558]
Nigel Griffiths: Trade Partners UK work in the United Kingdom and in overseas markets to offer appropriate advice to British exporters and investors seeking to do business. Trade Partners UK staff refer inquiries from companies about export licence requirements for all markets to the 'DTI's Export Control Organisation'. Ultimately, it is the responsibility of the exporting company to ensure that any export it makes complies with export control legislation in force at the time of the export.
Office of Communications
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what the estimated cost of setting up and running the shadow Ofcom is. [7791]
Mr. Alexander: A "shadow Ofcom" is not proposed, however, The Office of Communications Bill proposes to establish Ofcom to prepare to receive its regulatory functions at a later stage.
Employment Tribunals
Mrs. Helen Clark: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many applications were registered by the Employment Tribunal Service in 2000–01; how many of these cases were disposed of; in how many of these cases costs were awarded against (i) the applicant and (ii) the respondent; and what the average costs award was in each case. [8066]
Alan Johnson: The Employment Tribunals Service registered 130,408 applications in 2000–2001.
During this period, a total of 92,938 cases were disposed of, with costs being awarded in 247 cases, of which 167 were awarded against the applicant and 80 were awarded against the respondent.
The average cost award was £295.
- Source:
- Employment Tribunals Service
Airline Aid
Dr. Cable: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what plans she has to ask the Office of Fair Trading to investigate competition between UK airlines, and between UK and overseas airlines, following recent state intervention to assist the airline industry. [8019]
Miss Melanie Johnson: The Office of Fair Trading has the power to investigate any market in which it believes anti-competitive activity may be occurring as the independent competition authority charged with such powers.
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