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Housing

Mr. Pickles: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many vacant local authority dwellings there are in England, broken down by (a) local authority area and (b) region; and if he will make a statement. [104175]

Mr. McNulty: Information on the number of vacant local authority dwellings at 1 April 2002 in England, broken down by local authority area has been placed in the Library of the House.

Numbers of vacant local authority dwellings at 1 April 2002 in England, broken down by region are tabled as follows.

Region	Number of vacant LA dwellings at 1 April 2002
North East	8,400
North West	18,400
Yorkshire and Humberside	15,400
East Midlands	6,200
West Midlands	10,800
East of England	3,500
London	10,000
South East	3,300
South West	2,200
England	78,100

Notes:

1. Figures rounded to nearest 100.

2. England total may not equal sum of regional components due to rounding.

3. Regional figures include estimates for numbers of vacant local authority dwellings owned outside a local authority's boundary.

Source:

ODPM's Housing Strategy Statistical Appendix completed by local authorities.

25 Mar 2003 : Column 178W

Mr. Pickles: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the housing stock is in each London borough in the (a) private rented, (b) council owned and (c) housing association sectors. [104180]

Mr. McNulty: Estimates of the number of housing stock in each London borough in the (a) private rented, (b) council owned and (c) housing association sectors as at April 2001, are shown in the following table:

Housing stock by rented sector by local authority in London at April 2001

	Privately rented households(13)	LA dwelling stock(14)	RSL dwelling stock(15)
London(16)	520,900	532,200	271,100
Inner London(16)	271,900	329,700	149,900
Camden	25,400	27,000	8,200
City of London	1,300	2,100	200
Hackney	14,800	28,400	18,400
Hammersmith and Fulham	17,700	14,400	10,900
Haringey	22,000	19,800	8,900
Islington	15,300	31,400	10,600
Kensington and Chelsea	24,000	7,300	11,900
Lambeth	25,400	35,800	16,400
Lewisham	15,400	31,400	8,700
Newham	18,300	23,800	9,100
Southwark	15,900	49,000	11,800
Tower Hamlets	14,600	27,100	13,500
Wandsworth	28,900	18,600	9,200
Westminster	33,000	13,600	11,900
Outer London(16)	249,000	202,500	121,200
Barking and Dagenham	4,700	23,000	1,900
Barnet	23,500	12,100	5,300
Bexley	6,700	0	13,200
Brent	20,200	10,800	11,600
Bromley	12,200	0	17,400
Croydon	20,100	15,300	8,100
Ealing	21,400	14,900	8,000
Enfield	13,100	13,700	5,100
Greenwich	10,700	27,600	9,300
Harrow	10,800	5,900	2,300
Havering	6,100	12,000	1,600
Hillingdon	10,800	11,600	3,900
Hounslow	13,400	15,100	5,200
Kingston upon Thames	10,700	5,100	1,600
Merton	13,400	7,200	3,900
Redbridge	13,400	5,300	3,000
Richmond upon Thames	14,500	0	9,200
Sutton	7,900	9,000	3,000
Waltham Forest	15,500	13,800	7,500

⁽¹³⁾ Source: Census 2001 Key Statistics Table 18. Figures are number of households as at 29 April 2001. Dwelling figures from census not yet available but the difference is not expected to be significant.

⁽¹⁴⁾ Source: ODPM Housing Strategy Statistical Appendix 2001–02 return for stock at 1 April 2001.

⁽¹⁵⁾ Source: Housing Corporation's annual Regulatory and Statistical Return for stock as at 31 March 2001.

⁽¹⁶⁾ Figures may not add up due to rounding.

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Mr. Edward Davey: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the administrative costs were of the Housing Corporation for each Government Office of the regions in each year since 1999–2000. [102681]

Mr. McNulty: In meetings its headquarters and field office administration costs, the Housing Corporation incurred expenditure as follows:

£ million

Year	London	South	Central	North	HQ	Total
1999–2000	3.825	3.303	2.997	3.627	16.195	29.947
2000–01	4.179	3.510	3.159	3.866	15.892	30.607
2001–02	4.372	3.913	3.379	4.150	18.287	34.100
2002–03(17)	4.853	4.393	3.698	4.511	18.245	(17)35.700

⁽¹⁷⁾ The 2002–03 costs are based on current estimates.

Local Government

Mr. Gareth Thomas: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what action he is taking to improve the quality and range of applications for senior jobs in local government; and if he will make a statement. [100594]

Mr. Leslie: The Government recognises and is taking steps to address the issue of recruitment and retention across the local government sector. I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave him on 13 February 2003, Official Report, column 93W, which sets out the wider work the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is engaged in recruitment and retention in local government and raising its profile as a good choice of career. On 19 February 2003, My right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr. Raynsford) announced the full programme of Capacity Building initiatives and committed £27 million to help fund this work. This programme will help draw in top quality people by improving the attractiveness of the sector as a potential employer, and ensure the long term development of effective senior management.

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is working closely with the Employers' Organisation (EO) on the development of key parts of this programme. This will complement the work already being undertaken by the EO into recruitment of senior management. This includes: a consultancy service to support local authorities recruit at senior levels; a comprehensive guide to recruiting senior posts, due to be published in April 2003; and a research project to identify the main barriers to recruiting senior management to inform future work.

Parliamentary Questions

Mr. Pickles: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many questions have been tabled for reply by his Department since May 2002; and on how many

25 Mar 2003 : Column 180W

occasions the reply given was that (a) providing the information involved disproportionate costs and (b) the information was not available centrally. [91631]

Mr. Leslie: Since its formation on 29 May 2002 till the beginning of March 2003, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has answered 1,952 Commons Parliamentary Questions. Information on 49 questions was not held in the form requested. A further 38 questions were given a "disproportionate cost" answer as the information was not held centrally.

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many named day written questions were tabled to the Department between 15 October 2002 and 24 February 2003; how many that received a holding answer were given a substantive answer (a) within three days, (b) within seven days, (c) within 14 days, (d) within 28 days and (e) over 28 days later; and what procedures the Department has in place to monitor performance on answering (i) Parliamentary Questions and (ii) ministerial letters. [99429]

Mr. Leslie: The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister uses a database that records and reports performance in answering Parliamentary Questions. This database records how many PQs are answered on time, one day late, between two and five days late, between six and ten days late and eleven or more days late. The details for Named Day PQs for the period 15 October 2002 up to and including 24 February 2003 is detailed in the table. Of the three PQs answered over 11 days after the Named Day, two were given substantive answers within 28 days and one over 28 days later.

	Named days
PQs	322
On time	273
Percentage	84.8
1 day late	12
Percentage	3.7
2–5 days	29
Percentage	9.0
6–10 days	5
Percentage	1.6
11+	3
Percentage	0.9

The Cabinet Office, on an annual basis, publishes a report to Parliament on performance of departments in replying to ministerial correspondence. The Report for 2001 was published on Friday 24 May 2002, Official Report, column 674W. The Report for 2002 will be published in due course.

Rate Support Grant

Mr. Ruffley: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how much the rate support grant was in (a) Suffolk county council, (b) Mid Suffolk district council and (c) St. Edmundsbury borough council in each year since 1997. [104817]

Mr. Raynsford: There are two funding streams to help support revenue funding by local authorities. These are Revenue Support Grant (RSG) and redistributed non-domestic rates (NNDR). It is important to look at the

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total of these funding streams in order to compare support from central Government year-on-year, since the level of non- domestic rates can vary year-on-year.

Since 1997 there have been many changes in local government functions and funding. To enable a like-for-like comparison between years, we calculate adjusted grants. The percentage change figures have been calculated on the basis of these like-for-like comparisons.

Until the introduction of Central Support Protection Grant in 1999–2000, there was no need to calculate grant on a like-for-like basis, and for this reason grant

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comparisons in the years 1997–98 and 1998–99 are not available. There were no changes in funding and function between 1998–99 and 1999–2000 that needed reflecting in adjusted grants for 1998–99 to allow a like-for-like comparison; the actual 1998–99 values have therefore been used in this case.

The table shows the amount of RSG, NNDR and formula grant (RSG, NNDR and the Standard Statements Assessments (SSA) Reduction Grant (where appropriate)) received by the authorities during the period. The tables also show the year-on-year changes in formula grant on a like-for-like basis.

Suffolk County Council

	RSG (£ million)	NNDR (£ million)	Formula Grant (£ million)	Percentage change in grant
1997–98	157.459	127.736	285.195
1998–99	159.540	134.712	294.252	N/A
1999–2000	162.953	147.267	310.220	5.4
Adjusted 1999–2000	162.951	147.268	310.219
2000–01	156.949	167.715	324.664	4.7
Adjusted 2000–01	156.250	167.339	323.589
2001–02	172.189	164.430	336.618	4.0
Adjusted 2001–02	149.248	163.383	312.630
2002–03	151.530	180.585	332.115	6.2
Adjusted 2002–03	169.029	180.585	349.614
2003–04	191.530	179.409	370.939	6.1

Mid Suffolk District Council

	RSG (£ million)	NNDR (£ million)	SSA Reduction Grant (£ million)	Formula Grant (£ million)	Percentage Change in Grant
1997–98	1.480	2.526	0.031	4.037
1998–99	1.428	2.579	0.000	4.007	N/A
1999–2000	1.424	2.795	0.000	4.219	5.3
Adjusted 1999–2000	1.424	2.794	0.000	4.219
2000–01	1.249	3.120	0.000	4.369	3.6
Adjusted 2000–01	1.240	3.158	0.000	4.398
2001–02	1.476	3.145	0.000	4.620	5.1
Adjusted 2001–02	1.272	3.252	0.000	4.524
2002–03	1.176	3.552		4.728	4.5
Adjusted 2002–03	1.081	3.552		4.633
2003–04	2.176	3.036		5.212	12.5

St Edmundsbury

	RSG (£ million)	NNDR (£ million)	Formula Grant (£ million)	Percentage change in grant
1997–98	2.202	2.955	5.157
1998–99	2.101	3.001	5.103	N/A
1999–2000	2.013	3.229	5.242	2.7
Adjusted 1999–2000	2.013	3.228	5.242
2000–01	1.924	3.702	5.626	7.3
Adjusted 2000–01	1.920	3.747	5.667
2001–02	2.050	3.634	5.684	0.3
Adjusted 2001–02	1.822	3.758	5.580
2002–03	1.703	4.114	5.817
Adjusted 2002–03	1.576	4.114	5.690	4.3
2003–04	2.656	3.430	6.086	7.0

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