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Community Buy-outs
Pete Wishart: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what the capital cost of each community buy-out has been since 1994, and if she will list awards to assist in community buy-outs from the new opportunities Fund's Scottish Land Fund that have been awarded since February 2001. [38699]
Mr. Caborn: Since February 2001 the Scottish Land Fund has awarded a total of 41 grants to date totalling ÿ4,661,243. Of these, 17 have been for acquisition purposes totalling ÿ4,084,613.
The following table gives further details of all awards made to date.
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Stadiums
Mr. Woodward: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how much funding has been made available (a) from her Department and (b) from the National Lottery, for assisting in capital building projects for (i) football stadiums and (ii) rugby league stadiums in (A) 1999, (B) 2000 and (C) 2001. [37188]
Mr. Caborn: The information is as follows:
| Sport | Year | National Lottery | Football Foundation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Football | 1999 | 1120,000,000 | 11,750,000 |
| 2000 | 292,000,000 | 17,855,000 | |
| 2001 | — | 16,274,000 | |
| Rugby League | 1999 | — | — |
| 2000 | — | — | |
| 2001 | 312,142 | — |
1 All of this funding is for the English National Stadium.
2 This funding is for the Commonwealth Games Venue at Manchester SportCity which will eventually become the home ground for Manchester City FC.
Targeted Lottery Initiative
Mr. Watson: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will give details of the English areas which will benefit from the targeted Lottery initiative she announced on 27 June 2001; and if she will indicate how these areas were chosen. [39862]
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Tessa Jowell: The Community Fund and the New Opportunities Fund have selected 51 areas in England to benefit from the initiative. These are Ashfield, Barking & Dagenham, Barnsley, Basildon, Blackpool, Blyth Valley, Bolsover, Bolton, Bournemouth, Brent, Burnley, Darlington, Derby, Doncaster, Dudley, Ellesmere Port and Neston, Enfield, Great Yarmouth, Hyndburn, Kingston upon Hull, Kirklees, Knowsley, Luton, North East Lincolnshire, North Somerset, Oldham, Pendle, Peterborough, Portsmouth, Rochdale, Rotherham, Salford, Sandwell, Sefton, Solihull, St. Helens, Stockton-on-Tees, Swindon, Tameside, Telford and Wrekin, Tendring, Thanet, Trafford, Wakefield, Walsall, Waltham Forest, Wansbeck, Waveney, West Lancashire, Wigan and Wirral.
The criteria I announced for the scheme were that areas should be both deprived and have received less lottery funding than other parts of the country. To select the English Fair Share areas, the two distributors have analysed which of the 100 most deprived local authority districts have received less than average funding from the Community Fund and which have received less than average funding from the other Lottery distributors collectively. Areas that have received less than average funding from either the Community Fund or from the other Distributors collectively will receive direct support from Fair Share.
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The Fair Share initiative is one of several targeted initiatives operated by the Lottery distributors. Government will continue to encourage distributors to ensure that parts of the country benefit from Lottery funding.
Art Exports
Mr. Colman: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport when the 2000–01 Annual report of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art will be published. [40172]
Dr. Howells: The Reviewing Committee's Annual Report for 2000–01 has been published today and copies have been laid before Parliament.
EDUCATION AND SKILLS
Enron
Mr. Austin Mitchell: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what meetings (a) she and (b) her senior departmental officials have had with Enron and its subsidiaries in the last two years. [32436]
Mr. Ivan Lewis: Ministers and civil servants meet many people as part of the process of policy development and analysis. All such contacts are conducted in accordance with the Ministerial Code, the Civil Service Code and Guidance for Civil Servants: Contact with Lobbyists. Some of these discussions take place on a confidential basis, and in order to preserve confidentiality, it is not the normal practice of Governments to release details of specific meetings with private individuals or companies.
Theft and Fraud
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, pursuant to her answer of 28 January 2002, Official Report, column 102W, on theft and fraud, if she will make a statement on the circumstances of the incident of direct contractor fraud; and what assessment she has made of reasons for the increasing trend of theft and fraud in her Department between 1997-98 and 2000-01. [34281]
Estelle Morris: I reported in my answer of 28 January 2002, Official Report, column 101W, that there had been 44 instances of direct contractor fraud since 1997–98.
They relate to instances of suspected fraud/irregularity referred to the Department's Special Investigations Unit (SIU) for investigation and cover the European Social Fund, Schools, Training and Enterprise Councils, Teacher Pensions and miscellaneous Programme Budgets.
The nature of the problems identified relate primarily to claims for services not properly provided or for inflated costs.
Within my Department we have, over the last few years, run a Fraud and Control Awareness campaign to raise staff awareness as to their responsibilities for reporting and handling suspicions/allegations etc. We
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are satisfied that those reporting systems now work well, and that, as a result, all concerns are properly reported and investigated.
My Department recognises the importance of having sound control systems in place to combat the threat of fraud. In fact 30 per cent. of the cases investigated were identified as a result of the operation of normal control procedures.
We regularly review the contract management arrangements in place to ensure effective control over public funds and take steps, where necessary, to enhance procedures. For example, since April 2000, in agreement with the European Commission, the Department, through its Government Offices, has introduced new financial monitoring and inspection arrangements with regard to ESF, some of which has resulted in cases being referred to SIU.
In my earlier response, the estimated cost to the Department for 2000–01 is shown as ÿ17.3 metre, which, when shown against the earlier years' figures, suggests a substantial increase. However this figure includes some exceptional items to the value of ÿ14.9 metre.
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