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Parental Leave Directive

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what estimate she has made of the (a) financial costs and (b) benefits to her Department of the Parental Leave Directive. [42486]

Ms Rosie Winterton: Staff in the Lord Chancellor's Department and agencies have always benefited from generous flexible working and leave arrangements, and have been able to take unpaid leave and career breaks with the agreement of local managers. We have incorporated the employer's obligations under the

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Parental Leave Directive in our flexible working policies, and staff are able to take up their entitlement under the directive. We keep no separate record of this and therefore have not recorded costs separately.

Flexible Working

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many and what proportion of the staff of her Department are (a) job sharing, (b) term working and (c) engaged in another form of flexible working. [42427]

Ms Rosie Winterton: (a) 2,291 staff currently work reduced hours, a large proportion of whom are engaged on a job-share or job-split arrangement.

(b) While some staff may arrange to work term times only, we keep no separate central records for staff working that particular arrangement, as it would be recorded centrally as an individual working reduced hours.

(c) There are a number of other alternative and flexible working patterns that employees are welcome to take up under the Department's work-life balance policies, such as flexi-time, home working and compressed hours. The flexibility of the pattern is decided in conjunction with local management to suit an individual's need and the needs of their work. Other than those working reduced hours (see (a) above), no central records are kept of these arrangements.

Age Discrimination

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what his Department's policy is towards age discrimination. [42570]

Ms Rosie Winterton: The Department has incorporated age into its equal opportunities policies, and is reviewing its employment policies in line with the recommendations in the Performance and Innovation Unit Report, "Winning the Generation Game".

Parliamentary Questions

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will take steps to improve the response time to parliamentary questions. [47716]

Mr. Wills: In its response to the Public Administration Select Committee's Second Report of Session 2000–2001 on Ministerial Accountability and Parliamentary Questions, the Government made clear its commitment to providing prompt and accurate answers to Parliamentary Questions. This continues to be the Government's position.

TRANSPORT, LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND

THE REGIONS

London Development Agency

Tom Brake: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions what plans the Government have for the role of the London Development Agency in promoting a model of economic

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growth that would discourage further in-migration from (a) the regions of the UK and (b) overseas into London. [50051]

Alan Johnson: I have been asked to reply.

None. The London Development Agency is a functional body of the Greater London authority, reporting to the Mayor of London. It is for the Mayor to approve and publish the London Development Agency's strategy, which sets out the agency's objectives and regional priorities.

TREASURY

Forms P85 and P85S

Matthew Taylor: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many completed versions of forms (a) P85 and (b) P85S the Inland Revenue has received in each of the last five fiscal years; and if he will make a statement. [38261]

Dawn Primarolo: I regret the production of such statistics in a form which would enable me to say how many completed versions of forms (a) P85 and (b) P85S the Inland Revenue has received in each of the last five fiscal years would involve disproportionate cost.

Special Advisers

Mr. Andrew Turner: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many special advisers were employed by the Treasury (a) between 1 May and 31 December 1997 and (b) in each year from 1998 to 2001 inclusive; and what the total amount spent on special advisers by the Department was in each of those years. [41255]

Ruth Kelly: I refer the hon. Member to the answers I gave to the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) on 11 February 2002, Official Report, column 115W and 16 April 2002, Official Report, column 857W, and the answer given to the hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) on 11 May 2001, a copy of which is available in the Library.

Mr. Burns: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many special advisers there were in his Department; and what their salaries were in each of the last five years. [46943]

Ruth Kelly [holding answer 10 April 2002]: I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to him by the Prime Minister on 10 April 2002, Official Report, column 11W. I also refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) on 16 April 2002, Official Report, column 857W.

Children's Tax Credit

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many families have applied for the children's tax credit; and how many of these applications have (a) been successful and (b) failed. [42518]

Dawn Primarolo: The Inland Revenue have invited claims for the children's tax credit from PAYE taxpayers. They have received about 3.7 million forms to date and it is estimated that 3.3 million taxpayers have CTC in their tax codes. The latest survey data suggest that around

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3.7 million families might be expected to claim through PAYE and that an additional 900,000 taxpayers will be expected to claim the CTC later, via self-assessment.

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many families are in receipt of the children's tax credit, broken down into (a) those who receive the full credit, (b) those who receive a partial credit because they have a comparatively small tax liability and (c) those who receive a partial credit because they earn too much to receive the full credit. [46472]

Dawn Primarolo: It is estimated that about 3.3 million taxpayers have the children's tax credit (CTC) in their 2001–02 tax codes. On (c) about 0.1 million have a reduced value in the code adjustment because it is estimated that they are on the CTC taper. On (b), it is not known for how many families the CTC eliminates the tax deducted from their earnings; this depends on their total earnings in the year.

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many people are expected to apply retrospectively for the children's tax credit for 2001–02 because they are self-employed. [46473]

Dawn Primarolo: It is estimated that there are about 0.8 million families with income from self-employment who will benefit from the children's tax credit.

Landfill

Ian Stewart: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will consider changes to the landfill tax to support the achievement of the Government's waste policy. [47161]

Mr. Boateng: The landfill tax contributes to the achievement of the Government's waste targets by making waste producers take account of the environmental costs they impose when they discard waste to landfill.

Efficiency Savings

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the target has been in each of the last five years for efficiency savings as a percentage of total running costs for each of the non-departmental public bodies for which he is responsible; and if the target was met. [49639]

Ruth Kelly: The Chancellor of the Exchequer is not responsible for any non-departmental public bodies that set their own efficiency savings targets.

Office for National Statistics

Mr. Whittingdale: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many different questionnaires were sent out to (a) UK companies, (b) manufacturing companies and (c) distribution and services companies by the Office for National Statistics in 2001. [48926]

Ruth Kelly: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician. I have asked him to reply.

Letter from Len Cook to Mr. John Whittingdale, dated 17 April 2002:

As National Statistician I am responding to your recent question concerning statistical questionnaires sent to businesses by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). (48926)

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Of the 1.57m forms issued to UK companies in 2001, 29% went to the manufacturing sector and 66% to the distribution and services sector.

Sector definitions have been based on the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC)(92)).

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