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Aggregates Levy

Mr. Levitt: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the effect of the aggregates levy on (a) companies in the extraction industries, (b) the environment in the vicinity of quarries and (c) the quantity of recycled building materials being used. [104544]

John Healey: The aggregates levy has only been operational since 1 April 2002. Although Customs and Excise, who have responsibility for administering the levy, are monitoring its economic and environmental impacts, it is too early for an assessment to be made. Customs' monitoring takes account of data from specific research as well as information from business organisations, individual companies and environmental organisations.

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Customs Staff

Ms Atherton: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has that will affect the disposition of customs staff presently based in Devon and Cornwall; and if he will make a statement. [104872]

John Healey : I wrote to my hon. Friend on 6 March about Customs business plans for 2003–04 to 2005–06. For Customs to achieve their agreed public commitments on drugs, tobacco and VAT, they will deploy their resources differently by refocusing them in ways to produce the highest impact and outcomes.

In the Falmouth area, Customs are proposing a shift from fixed-location staffing to more flexible deployment in teams which will tackle fraud and smuggling in Falmouth and more widely across the south.

Domestic Abuse

Margaret Moran: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has and what steps he has taken since 2001 to provide finance for public programmes that aim to raise awareness of domestic abuse and to provide services for those victims. [97742]

Mr. Bob Ainsworth : I have been asked to reply.

I refer my hon. Friend to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Denham) on 17 March 2003, Official Report, column 580W.

ECOFIN Council

Mr. Hood: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the outcome was of the ECOFIN Council held on 19 March; what the Government's stance was on the issues discussed, including its voting record; and if he will make a statement. [104559]

Dawn Primarolo : I attended the ECOFIN meeting on 19 March in my capacity as Chair of the Code of Conduct Group. The UK Permanent Representative and Jon Cunliffe represented the UK.

ECOFIN considered the tax package and all member states but one reached political agreement on the text of the Savings Directive, the text of the Interest and Royalties Directive and the results of the Code of Conduct Group. ECOFIN reaffirmed their commitment formally to adopt the tax package as soon as possible.

At ECOFIN all delegations except Austria reached political agreement on the taxation of energy, based on proposals for an energy products directive put to the council to the 11 December 2002 ECOFIN meeting. At an informal Finance Ministers meeting on 20 March in the margins of the European Council, Austria agreed to lift their reservation. ECOFIN will adopt the energy products directive once consultation with the European Parliament and with accession countries has been completed. The energy products directive will, from 1 January 2004, increase the existing Community minimum rates of duty on oils (with a second increase in the minimum rate of duty on diesel from 1 January 2010), and provide a Community framework, with minimum rates of duty, for the taxation of other energy products: electricity, natural gas, coal and other solid fuels.

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The directive meets all of the UK's main interests. In particular, the directive preserves the UK's right to exempt domestic and charity non-business use of energy from the climate change levy.

The Council heard a request from the Italian delegation concerning the application of article 88 (2) to measures to compensate farmers for milk quotas fines in Italy.

No votes were taken at the meeting.

Economic Cycle

Mr. Flight: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what assumptions were made concerning when the current economic cycle will end when making the conclusions of paragraph 2.54 of the pre-Budget report 2002; [105324]

(2) when he expects that the current economic cycle will end. [105350]

Ruth Kelly: As set out in paragraph B6 of the pre-Budget report November 2002 (Cm5664), the current economic cycle is projected to end in 2005–06.

Gibraltar

Mr. Rosindell: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when the most recent discussion between government officials and representatives of Gibraltar take place. [104796]

Mr. MacShane: I have been asked to reply.

Officials in a number of Government Departments have regular discussions with representatives of Gibraltar.

National Insurance

Mr. Webb: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what estimate he has made of the (a) value, (b) percentage and (c) numbers of national insurance contributions that were received by the Inland Revenue but remained unrecorded on an individual's national insurance record, in each of the last 10 years; [102603]

(2) what assessment he has made of the number of occasions in each of the last 10 years where national insurance contributions were deducted by employers and passed to the Government but not allocated to individual national insurance records; and if he will make a statement. [102608]

Dawn Primarolo: The Inland Revenue estimate that around 50 million end of year contribution returns are received each year. Around 4 per cent. of these contain incomplete or incorrect identifying details and cannot be allocated to an individual national insurance account without further information. Most of these non-matching items have no or little impact on people's benefit entitlements. The Inland Revenue works with employers to trace and match contributions, concentrating on cases where they are likely to have a significant impact on entitlement. Information about the value of these and number of contributions received

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but which remain unrecorded on individual's national insurance records for each of the last 10 years would be available only at disproportionate cost.

Public Finances

Mr. Flight: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what reasonable assumptions are referred to in paragraph 2.67 of the pre-Budget report 2002, on which the judgment that the public finances are sustainable in the longer term was based. [105329]

Ruth Kelly: The assumptions are presented in Chapter 5 of the Long-term Public Finance Report, which was published alongside the pre-Budget report in November 2002.

Student Debt

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many errors in the repayment of student loans have been lodged with the Inland Revenue Department by (a) members of the public and (b) hon. Members in each of the last three years. [105206]

Dawn Primarolo: The Inland Revenue does not keep this information. Errors should normally be notified to the Student Loan Company (which is responsible for notifying the Revenue when borrowers leave higher education) or the employer (who is responsible for making the right deductions from pay).

VAT

David Davis: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what notice was given of changes to VAT exemption for welfare services; [104529]

(2) what measures he has introduced to compensate private welfare agencies for the loss of input VAT recovery as a result of changes to VAT exemption; [104531]

(3) what plans he has to treat the provision of welfare services as being zero rated for VAT purposes rather than exempt. [104530]

John Healey: The Government's introduction of VAT exemption for welfare services provided by state-regulated private welfare agencies means that the 60,000 sick, elderly or disabled people who pay for home care services will no longer have to pay VAT on these services and we estimate that they could see a reduction in costs of up to 13 per cent.

I announced that this exemption would be available from 31 January 2003 in a written Ministerial statement on 19 December 2002, Official Report, column 80WS. Independent fostering agencies, whose supplies are to local authorities, may choose to postpone changing the VAT treatment of their supplies until 1 April while they make the contractual and financial arrangements that are necessary for them to implement the change. Other commercial welfare agencies are required to implement the change when they become state-regulated, the earliest date for which is 1 April 2003.

It is a fundamental principle of the VAT system that businesses may only recover VAT relating to taxable supplies. Commercial providers of VAT-exempt

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services will take a range of commercial factors, including overheads such as irrecoverable VAT, into account when setting their prices.

There are no plans to introduce a zero rate of VAT for commercially provided welfare services, since we are prevented from doing so by long-standing formal agreements with our European Union partners.

Mr. Cousins: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many cases of VAT evasion in the building repairs and maintenance industry Customs and Excise have (a) investigated and (b) secured additional VAT payments from in the last three financial years. [104726]

John Healey: The information requested is not kept by HM Customs and Excise.

Mr. Cousins: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what pilots he has conducted under the European Directive on VAT reduction tested; what the results were; and how these results compare with similar pilots in other EU states. [104727]

John Healey: We have conducted no pilots under the EC experiment to apply reduced VAT rates to certain 'labour intensive services', believing that there are currently more effective, better-targeted ways of increasing employment in the United Kingdom. An evaluation of the experiment is due to take place during 2003 in the context of the European Commission's planned review of the provisions governing the use of VAT reduced rates in the EU.

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