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Regional Government

Mr. Pickles: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what estimate he has made of the cost of introducing regional government in each English region; and if he will make a statement. [65860]

Mr. Raynsford: I refer the hon. Member to my answer of 24 May 2002 to the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key), Official Report, column 624W.

4 Jul 2002 : Column 559W

Local Government Workers

Ms Christine Russell: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what steps he is taking to guarantee the conditions of local government workers where they have been transferred to the private sector. [64340]

Mr. Raynsford: The Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions announced on 26 March measures to ensure fairness for all staff working on local authority contracts, including those transferred out of local government as a result of an outsourcing of a service.

In broad terms, the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 (as amended) (TUPE) protects employees' terms and conditions (except in relation to future occupational pensions) when the business in which they work is transferred from one employer to another, and the business retains its identity.

The measures we have announced include a commitment to legislate to make statutory within local government the provisions in the Cabinet Office 'Statement of Practice on Staff Transfers in the Public Sector' and the annex to it, 'A Fair Deal for Staff Pensions'. This will ensure that local authority contracting exercises are conducted on the basis that TUPE will apply, unless there are genuinely exceptional circumstances, and that transferees' pension benefits will be protected. New statutory guidance to local authorities will also set out a package of measures which will ensure that new joiners taken on to work beside transferees on local government contracts will be treated fairly.

Local Government Finance

Mr. Webb: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will list for each English local authority, the level of spending on (a) education and (b) social services expressed as a percentage of the SSA for that service in that authority in 2001–02. [65091]

Mr. Raynsford: The information has been placed in the Library of the House.

Personal Social Services

Mr. Nigel Jones: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how much each local authority in England and Wales with social services responsibilities (a) spent on personal social services and (b) was allocated for personal social services by standard spending assessment in each of the last five years for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement. [65202]

Mr. Raynsford: Figures for England have been placed in the Library of the House. Figures for Wales are the responsibility of the National Assembly for Wales.

Capital Receipts

Chris Grayling: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will make a statement on plans to distribute capital receipts from local authority housing sales via a central pool. [65671]

Mr. McNulty: Last December's local government White Paper—"Strong Local Leadership—Quality Public Services"—set out our intention to introduce arrangements to pool a proportion of future housing capital receipts

4 Jul 2002 : Column 560W

arising in debt-free authorities for use to finance new housing investment where the need is greatest. The change, which will be introduced alongside other changes to the local government capital finance system, will bring the treatment of debt-free authorities in line with the arrangements that apply to other authorities. We will be consulting on the detailed operation of the pooling shortly.

Single Regeneration Budget

Ms Shipley: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the nominal Single Regeneration Budget's lifetime expenditure on physical regeneration will be. [66240]

Mr. McNulty: 1,027 schemes under the six rounds of the Single Regeneration Budget stand to receive over £5.7 billion of SRB grant over their lifetime of up to seven years, many of which include physical regeneration activities. However, due to the holistic, multiple-objective nature of the majority of these schemes, it is not possible to say how much of SRB funding is available by specific activity including physical regeneration.

Deprivation

Mr. Hopkins: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the rank is of each local authority that has undertaken a full or partial transfer since 1997 under (a) the 1998 Index of Local Deprivation and (b) the Indices of Deprivation 2000, in each year. [64393]

Mr. McNulty: The table sets out those authorities who have undertaken full or partial transfer since 1998 by their rank on the extent measure of the Index of Local Deprivation 1998 and the Indices of Deprivation 2000. The extent measure shows the proportion of the local authority's population living in one of the 10 per cent. most deprived wards in England. It should be noted that the extent measure is one of the four measures of deprivation in the ILD and one of the six district measures in the ID 2000.

Authority	Extent measure— ILD 1998	Extent measure— ID 2000
Allerdale BC	153	82
Basildon DC	158	90
Bath and North East Somerset C	158	158
Birmingham CC	15	37
Blackburn with Darwen BC	43	15
Boston BC	158	158
Burnley BC	74	62
Calderdale MBC	57	75
Chelmsford BC	158	158
Chester CC	135	103
Chichester DC	158	158
Congleton BC	158	158
Cotswold DC	158	158
Coventry CC	38	50
Derbyshire Dales	158	158
East Hertfordshire	158	158
East Lindsey DC	114	59
East Northamptonshire DC	158	158
East Staffordshire BC	143	114
Eden C	158	158
Elmbridge BC	158	158
Erewash BC	152	155
Fylde BC	158	158
Horsham DC	158	158
Huntingdon DC	158	158
Kerrier DC	120	49
LB Bexley	127	158
LB Brent	21	78
LB Enfield	77	95
LB Greenwich	16	47
LB Hackney	1	1
LB Hammersmith and Fulham	14	99
LB Islington	3	9
LB Lambeth	5	79
LB Merton	107	158
LB Richmond	158	158
LB Tower Hamlets	4	2
Lichfield DC	158	158
Liverpool CC	11	7
Manchester CC	8	4
Mendip DC	158	158
Mid-Bedfordshire DC	158	158
Newcastle Under Lyme BC	158	112
North Devon DC	158	104
Oldham BC	37	39
Preston BC	26	46
Reigate and Banstead BC	158	158
Restormel BC	158	158
Rother DC	158	158
Shrewsbury and Atcham BC	158	158
South Hams District Council	158	158
South Oxfordshire DC	158	158
South Somerset DC	158	158
South Staffs C	155	158
St. Edmundsbury	158	158
Staffordshire Moorlands DC	158	147
Stoke-on-Trent CC	55	54
Sunderland CC	34	26
Tameside	100	102
Telford and Wrekin	158	89
Test Valley BC	158	158
Tewkesbury BC	158	158
Torbay BC	115	158
Tynedale BC	158	158
West Devon BC	158	158
West Lindsey DC	110	121
West Oxfordshire DC	158	158
West Somerset DC	158	158
West Wiltshire DC	158	158
Weymouth and Portland C	158	124
Wirral	60	57
Worthing BC	121	158
Wyre Forest DC	158	129

4 Jul 2002 : Column 561W

Housing (Older People)

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister when he will publish the choice and quality in housing for older people guidance strategy that has been conducted with the Department of Health; and if he will make a statement. [65058]

Mr. McNulty: I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) on 27 June 2002, Official Report, column 1034W.

Temporary Accommodation

Margaret Moran: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what further measures he is taking to increase supply of temporary accommodation to replace the use of bed-and-breakfast for the homeless. [65184]

Mr. McNulty: In March 2002 we announced a £35 million programme to help local authorities ensure that by March 2004 no homeless family with children is in bed-and-breakfast hotels (B&B) for more than six weeks.

On 17 June 2002 almost £25 million was allocated to 44 high B&B using local authorities to assist them reduce numbers in B&B. The funding is being used on a range of initiatives to procure alternative temporary accommodation to B&B and on measures to prevent

4 Jul 2002 : Column 562W

homelessness occurring. We are now working with the next 40 or so highest using B&B authorities to see how we can assist them in reducing numbers.

In addition, all local authorities will benefit from the changes the Department for Work and Pensions has recently made to housing benefit subsidy levels which make local authority leasing of self-contained temporary accommodation much more financially viable than B&B hotels.

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