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Water Abstraction

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in what way catchment abstraction management strategies will include the water requirements of UK Biodiversity Action Plan priority habitats in England and Wales. [70184]

Mr. Meacher [holding answer 17 July 2002]: UK Biodiversity Action Plan priority habitats will be included as one of the environmental considerations when Catchment Abstraction Management Strategies are prepared.

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many abstraction licence holders have voluntarily converted their licences of right to time limited licences since the publication of Taking Water Responsibly. [70183]

Mr. Meacher [holding answer 17 July 2002]: None. There have, though, been a few instances where the Environment Agency has reached agreement with an applicant, in the context of an application to vary a permanent licence, that the whole licence be subject to a time limit.

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of how catchment abstraction management strategies will contribute to the good status requirements of the EC water framework directive. [70186]

Mr. Meacher [holding answer 17 July 2002]: The control of abstractions is required by the EC water framework directive as part of the programme of measures that contribute to good status requirements. Catchment Abstraction Management Strategies will provide the Environment Agency with the tools to put the necessary controls in place.

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of when the 80 per cent. of abstraction licences held as licences of right will be transferred to time limited status in accordance with Taking Water Responsibly; and what mechanisms her Department proposes to use to make this transition. [70185]

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Mr. Meacher [holding answer 17 July 2002]: "Taking Water Responsibly" tasked the Environment Agency with developing plans, as part of its Catchment Abstraction Management Strategies (CAMS) programme, to convert existing permanent licences to time limited status on a prioritised basis, and also to consider establishing incentives in its Charges Scheme to encourage this. The first round of the agency's CAMS programme will take another seven years to be completed for the whole of England and Wales. It is intended to address the conversion of licences to time limited status as part of this process. The agency will also be consulting later this year on proposed revisions to its Charges Scheme, which are likely to include financial incentives to encourage voluntary conversion. "Taking Water Responsibly" (paragraph 7.12) acknowledged that "the process of conversion of existing licences to time limited status may be quite protracted".

Common Agricultural Policy

Paddy Tipping: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many payments of financial support under the CAP in England and Wales were (a) between £200,000 and £499,999, (b) between £500,000 and £999,999 and (c) in excess of £1 million, in the last year for which figures are available. [70044]

Mr. Morley [holding answer 17 July 2002]: The table gives numbers of individual payments of financial support under the CAP to addresses in England and Wales in each category. Some businesses may have received more than one payment, or may have had trading interests outside the region of the address to which the payments were made.

	£200,000 to £499,999	£500,000 to £999,999	Over £1 million
Grants and subsidies
England	158	11	3
Wales(16)	0	0	0
Market support
England	523	125	33
Wales	82	42	33

⁽¹⁶⁾ Figures relate to the 12 months ending June 2002, except for grants and subsidies for Wales which relates to the EAGGF budget year ending in 2000, the last year for which figures were readily available.

Small Farms

Mr. Weir: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much has been paid to small farmers in (a) Scotland, (b) Wales and (c) England in each of the last five years for set-aside. [70437]

Mr. Morley [holding answer 17 July 2002]: Small farmers, defined in the EU's Arable Area Payments Scheme (AAPS) as those claiming for an area producing not more than the equivalent of 92 tonnes of cereals, have only been eligible for set-aside payments since the year 2000. Approximate figures for payments since then are as follows.

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£000

	2000	2001
(a) Scotland	211	311
(b) Wales	15	61
(c) England	957	2,924

Honey Bees

Mr. Steen: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of the work done by Bee Disease Insurance Limited to prevent the outbreak of harmful diseases among honey bees. [70451]

Mr. Morley: Insurance against the loss of colonies and equipment as a result of infection with notifiable bee diseases is a valuable tool in disease control. The Department welcomes the work of Bee Diseases Insurance Ltd. which serves to encourage beekeepers in England to play their part in the identification of notifiable diseases, and to bring any suspected incidents of these to the attention of the Central Science Laboratory's National Bee Unit.

Central Science Laboratory

Mr. Plaskitt: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what targets she has set the Central Science Laboratory for 2002–03. [71748]

Mr. Morley: I have set the Central Science Laboratory the following performance targets for 2002–03.

Quality of Service
1. To make satisfactory progress with the action plan resulting from the 2001–02 science audit.
2. To manage the Agency in an effective manner, including delivery of e-Government and commercial exploitation of research outputs.
3. To achieve a minimum of 85 per cent. of project milestones in commissioned projects which support the "Developing DEFRA" objectives.
4. To achieve a mean score of 4.0 on a scale of 0.5 for the assessment of customer satisfaction using the revised methodology.
Efficiency
5. To deliver the efficiency targets set out in the business plan.
Financial Performance
6. To recover from Government Departments, Agencies and external customers, the full economic costs of the Agency's services.

DEFENCE

Offset Obligations

Angus Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the cost and benefits of offset obligations incurred by United Kingdom defence companies as part of export defence agreements were in each year since 1992, broken down by nations and regions of the UK. [67308]

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Dr. Moonie: Such offset obligations are normally commercial transactions entered into by United Kingdom companies and overseas authorities. Information on these transactions is not held centrally by the Ministry of Defence.

There is, however, one Government-to-Government arrangement. Under the A1 Yamamah programme, Her Majesty's Government encourages commercial investment in Saudi Arabia as an offset to the programme costs to the Saudi Arabian Government. This arrangement, which is at no cost to the United Kingdom taxpayer, makes a valuable contribution to this important defence collaboration programme.

Royal Navy Submarines

Patrick Mercer: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what progress has been made on the testing of a new naval nuclear reactor core that will power Royal Navy submarines for their full operational life; and what problems have been experienced. [67708]

Dr. Moonie: The new naval nuclear reactor Core H that will power Royal Navy submarines for their full operational life is being tested at the Vulcan Naval Reactor Test Establishment located at Dounreay in Scotland. Full power trails started on 5 February 2002 and all initial test results were as predicted. No problems have been experienced with the new core during testing to date.

Patrick Mercer: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if the testing of a new naval nuclear reactor core that will power Royal Navy submarines for their full operational life has remained within his Department's estimated budget. [69842]

Dr. Moonie: The fixed price contract to deliver testing of the Royal Navy's new submarine reactor core has remained within the Equipment Programme 2002 budget.

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