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Vocational Rehabilitation

Mr. Boswell: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for Daventry on 10 December 2001, Official Report, column 617W, if he can now publish the findings of his literature and good practice reviews on vocational rehabilitation; and what progress has been made in developing conjunction with the Department of Health and national strategy for vocational rehabilitation. [48295]

Mr. Nicholas Brown: The report "Employment Programmes for Disabled People: Lessons from Research Evaluations" was published on 30 January 2002 as Report No. 90 in the departmental in-house report series. A copy is available in the Library.

Ministers from this Department and the Department of Health intend to meet in the near future to discuss possible arrangements for joint working on vocational rehabilitation.

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Post Office Card Account

Dr. Murrison: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what plans he has to delay the introduction of the post office card account. [47423]

Malcolm Wicks: The implementation of the card account is a matter for the Post Office. They hope to have accounts available from 2003 and have recently signed contracts with DWP, IR and NISSA to make these accounts available from this date.

Community Care

Mr. Kirkwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what has been the (a) budget and (b) outturn of (i) the community care grant budget and (ii) the loans budget, in (1) cash and (2) real terms in each year since 1997. [48642]

Malcolm Wicks: The available information is in the tables:

Table 1: Cash terms

	1997–98	1998–99	1999–2000	2000–01	2001–02	2002–03
	Budgets (£ million)
CCG Budget	97.0	98.0	98.0	100.0	103.0	108.0
Loans Budget	370.0	402.7	436.7	494.0	516.6	518.0
Contingency Reserve	0.5	0.5	0.5	2.0	1.0	1.0
In-year allocation to loans budget (£ million)	0	2.2	21.2	30.6	31.1	n/a
	Outturn (£)
CCG expenditure	96,499,000	97,774,000	98,139,000	99,978,000	n/a	n/a
Loans expenditure	366,225,000	404,364,000	457,784,000	501,150,000	n/a	n/a

Table 2: Real terms (at 2001–02 prices)

	1997–98	1998–99	1999–2000	2000–01	2001–02
	Budgets (£ million)
CCG Budget	106.6	104.7	102.3	102.5	103.0
Loans Budget	406.5	430.4	455.9	506.4	516.6
Contingency Reserve	0.5	0.5	0.5	2.1	1.0
In-year allocation to loans budget (£ million)	0	2.4	22.1	31.4	31.4
	Outturn (£)
CCG expenditure	106,010,000	104,489,000	102,443,000	102,443,000	n/a
Loans expenditure	402,320,000	432,134,000	477,859,000	513,679,000	n/a

Notes:

1. Figures for budgets and in-year allocations are rounded to the nearest £100,000

2. n/a means figures are not yet available

Source:

Annual Reports by the Secretary of State on the Social Fund 1997–98 to 2000–01

Social Fund Accounts 1997–98 to 2000–01

Recruitment

Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many Benefit Office employees recruited within the last 12 months have been over 55. [48706]

Mr. McCartney: The Department of Work and Pensions was formed in June 2001 from the former Department of Social Security (DSS) and parts of the Department for Education and Employment. The vast majority of Benefit paying employees were employed by the DSS, therefore the data supplied below has been taken from their legacy systems.

There have been 277 people over the age of 55 recruited into benefit paying offices between 1 April 2001 and 31 March 2002.

Disability Living Allowance

Mr. Kirkwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether those entitled to disability living allowance lower rate mobility component, but not the care component, who are also in receipt of disability premium in income support, will lose the latter entitlement if no longer eligible for the lower rate mobility component; and

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how many people are in receipt of the disability premium in income support solely as a result of entitlement to lower rate mobility component of DLA. [48640]

Malcolm Wicks: People receiving disability living allowance qualify for the disability premium within income support regardless of whether they receive the higher, middle or lower rate of either the care or mobility component, as any of these elements allows entitlement to the disability premium.

Information on the number of people in receipt of the disability premium in income support solely as a result of being entitled to the lower rate mobility component of disability living allowance is not available.

Social Fund

Mr. Kirkwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many applications for Social Fund loans have been (a) refused, (b) fully awarded and (c) partially awarded yearly since 1997. [48644]

Malcolm Wicks: The available information is in the tables.

Social fundThousands

Year	Total number of awards	Partial awards included in previous column	Refusals
Budgeting loans
1997–98	916	319	494
1998–99	935	315	442
1999–2000	1,017	533	647
2000–01	1,145	661	531
Crisis loans
1997–98	803	628	230
1998–99	866	690	247
1999–2000	939	746	336
2000–01	930	746	342

Notes:

1. The figures are rounded to the nearest thousand.

2. The figures do not include awards on review.

3. Comparison of the award figures should only be used as a guide as the award figures and partial award figures are taken from different tables in the Social Fund Policy, Budget and Management Information System and are counted different stages during the claim process.

4. Following the introduction of the new Budgeting Loan scheme in April 1999 there has been an increase in the number of partial awards as individual applicants are limited to a maximum available amount.

Source:

Annual Reports by the Secretary of State on the Social Fund 1997–98 to 2000–01.

Social Fund Policy, Budget and Management Information System.

DEFENCE

Underspends

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the (a) capital and (b) revenue underspend in his Department is expected to be in the financial year 2001–02. [47795]

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Mr. Ingram [holding answer 10 April 2002]: The Ministry of Defence's estimated outturn figures for 2001–02 will be published in the Budget report on 17 April 2002.

Training Estates Division

Ann Clwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) what overseas facilities are run by the British Army's Training Estates Division; and in which countries the facilities are located; [47617]

(2) which military and security forces have received training within the British Army's Training Estates Division overseas facilities since 2 May 1997; which countries were involved; what types of training were provided; and how many personnel were trained; [47616]

(3) what human rights criteria are used to assess which military and security personnel are eligible to receive training within the British Army's Training Estates Division overseas facilities. [47618]

Mr. Ingram: The Army Estates's Division is responsible for managing UK training areas only. Part of the Army's Land Warfare Centre (LWC) (formerly Training Support Command (Land)) has responsibility for the conduct of some overseas training. The LWC conducts training at four overseas facilities. These are in Germany, Canada, Belize and Kenya. In addition, the Field Army maintains a facility in Brunei, though this is not part of the LWC training estate. I should point out that the arrangements under which we use these facilities are different in every country and we are not responsible for the "running" of all the facilities in question.

Since 1997 large numbers of British units have trained at these facilities but details are not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. Foreign military personnel on attachment to British units and foreign observers have also participated in British exercises, but once again, details are not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

The LWC does offer jungle warfare training to members of foreign forces at its facilities in Belize. Since 1997 a total of 18 students have participated in this training, 12 from the Netherlands and six from the Ukraine.

In terms of formed foreign units that use the overseas facilities, certain NATO countries are permitted to conduct training at the facilities that the LWC operate in Germany under arrangements contained within the NATO Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA). This agreement in itself authorises the UK to manage facilities which are owned by the German Federal Government. In summary, the countries whose forces are permitted to train at these UK managed facilities are Belgium, Canada, France, the Netherlands, the USA and of course Germany itself. Since 1997, the formed foreign units that have trained here are Bundeswehr Units (31 Airborne Brigade, 313 Infantry Parachute Battalion, 272 Airborne Attack Defence Battalion, Seven Armoured Recognisance Battalion, 270 Airborne Supplies Company); German Specialist Units (GSG and SEK (German Civil Police Special Operations)); Belgian Units (two (BE) Commando Battalion, Regiment Beveijing—five Linie, Regiment De Chasseurs Ardennais and one BE Parachute); Dutch Units (108 Company (Special Forces) and HQ 11 Air

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Mobile Brigade); United States Units (75th Rangers) and multinational formations conducting Allied Rapid Reaction Corps training.

Because of the different arrangements that prevail, if forces from foreign nations wish to use the facilities that LWC use in Canada, Belize and Kenya, that would be matter for agreement between that country and the respective host nation. This would also apply if a country other than those specified in the SOFA wished to train on the British managed facilities in Germany.

The Ministry of Defence continues to play a role in fostering human rights through the Defence Diplomacy Mission which aims to dispel hostility, build and maintain trust and assist in the development of democratically accountable armed forces thereby making a significant contribution to conflict prevention. A key contribution to the fulfilment of this mission is provided by military training. Details of the Defence Diplomacy Mission including its objectives and scope is published in the MOD Policy Paper No 1; Defence Diplomacy (2001) a copy of which is in the Library of the House.

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