---

19 May 2003 : Column 589W—continued

Departmental Creche Facilities

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what crèche facilities are provided by his Department; and at what cost. [104300]

Jane Kennedy: The Northern Ireland Office does not provide crèche facilities for its staff, but it does provide assistance with the cost of child care for staff with pre-school aged children. In the last financial year the Department and its Agencies assisted 166 staff at a total cost of £113,600.

19 May 2003 : Column 590W

A number of departments within the Northern Ireland administration provide child care facilities.

The Northern Ireland Civil Service (NICS) Holiday Play schemes are designed to look after school age children of staff during the summer holidays. They are operated by volunteer management committees and are funded by DFP.

In addition, three departments offer limited financial assistance for child care to staff (selection is by way of an annual draw) and to assist parents encountering short-term child care difficulties one department operates an emergency Childcare Subsidy scheme.

The total funding available for these child care provisions is £81,284.

Departmental Website

Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the total cost of his Department's website was in the last 12 months; and how many hits it received in the same period. [104198]

Mr. Paul Murphy: I am sorry for the delay in replying.

The total cost of the Northern Ireland Office website from 1 April 2002 was £4,939.97 and it received 10,731,489 hits.

The total cost of the Northern Ireland Administration's websites from 1 April 2002 is £369,814 and they received 54,494,035 hits.

The Northern Ireland Executive also hosts a website with access to all the Northern Ireland Administration's websites which received 3,816,269 hits in this period.

Firearms Certificates

Mr. Donaldson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many applications for the renewal of firearms certificates by the holders of personal protection weapons have been made in each year since 1998; and how many of these renewal applications were approved during that period. [109216]

Jane Kennedy: The Chief Constable has advised me that the information requested, prior to 1 January 2001, is available only at disproportionate cost, but for the period from then to 31 December 2002 667 personal protection weapon applications were processed of which 552 (83 per cent.) were approved and 115 (17 per cent.) were refused.

Health Funding

Mr. Donaldson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what additional funding has been made available by the Eastern Health and Social Services Board to the Down Lisburn Trust in the current financial year to address the equity deficit. [113784]

Mr. Browne: The Eastern Health and Social Services Board have planned to allocate additional service development funds from April 2003 that are expected to reduce the current equity gap by £1.5 million for the population living in the Down Lisburn area.

19 May 2003 : Column 591W

Human Organs Inquiry

Mrs. Iris Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many (a) organs, (b) blocks and (c) slides were destroyed prior to the Human Organs Inquiry. [113372]

Mr. Browne: The Report of the Human Organs Inquiry states that:

"Each hospital we visited has kept records of post mortems conducted there. However those records were not designed to and do not provide a complete paper trail, revealing what exactly was removed, kept and then disposed of."

In the absence of complete records it is not possible to answer this question. The Report does acknowledge however that human organs and tissue were destroyed and records the experience of the Royal Group of Hospitals thus:

"At different times it seems that there were 'clearouts' of retained organs which were no longer required, sometimes on a weekly basis, sometimes every three months or so. The practices were too varied at different times for them to be usefully analysed in this Report".

Mrs. Iris Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether deceased persons' relatives who participated in the Human Organs Inquiry can obtain copies of the paperwork they supplied to the inquiry. [113373]

Mr. Browne: Files opened by the Human Organs Inquiry, including those containing correspondence with relatives, were placed in the Public Records Office for Northern Ireland when the inquiry completed its work in May 2002. They are currently held under a 30-year seal, which was applied to the documents to safeguard the privacy of all those involved. The Public Records Office will consider requests for documents held under seal. Where a member of the public wants to see a record that is closed, an application should be made in writing to the Public Records Office who in turn will arrange for the appropriate authority to be contacted on their behalf. Every request will be considered on its own merits.

Learning Difficulties

Mr. Beggs: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what provision exists for young people leaving moderate learning difficulty schools in Northern Ireland; what research (a) has been carried out to date and (b) is planned; and when it is intended to publish such research. [113866]

Jane Kennedy: I would refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave him on 29 April 2003, Official Report, column 334W, and can confirm that there has been no research commissioned by the Department of Education in this area other than that being undertaken by the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), nor is any other research planned by the Department.

Manufacturing

Mrs. Iris Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many jobs in the manufacturing industry in Northern Ireland have been lost since April 1998. [113501]

19 May 2003 : Column 592W

Mr. Pearson: There have been 23,979 redundancies in Northern Ireland confirmed to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment since the signing of the Belfast Agreement. Of these 18,077 (75 per cent.) were in the manufacturing industry. However, overall employment levels in Northern Ireland have risen by an estimated 68,000 over the same period.

Mr. McKenna

Mr. Gregory Campbell: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether Mr. McKenna of the Department of Education in Northern Ireland was informed of the aspects of his conduct which the complainant considered to be harassment, during the investigation which followed the formal complaint made in January 2001. [112353]

Jane Kennedy: My Department views very seriously all complaints of harassment and bullying. In its investigation of complaints it adheres fully to its internal policy on harassment and bullying. The policy affords those who have a complaint lodged against them the opportunity to obtain in full a copy of the written complaint of harassment. This will set out exactly the harassment complaint that has been lodged.

In providing this response I am conscious of the need to balance your interest in obtaining this information, or that of the person on whose behalf you are seeking it, with the requirement to respect the identity of the complainant and the member of staff against whom the complaint was lodged. I am content that the information I have provided does not compromise the identity of either individual.

Murders

Mr. Beggs: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many killings have taken place in Northern Ireland in each of the past five years, expressed (a) as a total and (b) as a percentage of the population. [109377]

Jane Kennedy: The following table shows the number of murders, manslaughter and infanticide offences recorded by the police in Northern Ireland in the past five years. The 2002–03 figures are provisional and may be subject to revision. The percentage per population figures are based on NISRA revised mid-year population estimates.

Financialyear	Murder	Manslaughter	Infanticide	Total	Percentage per population
1998–99	71	4	0	75	.004
1999–2000	29	5	0	34	.002
2000–01	44	4	0	48	.0029
2001–02	49	3	0	52	.003
2002–03	42	3	0	45	.0027

Occupational Therapists

Mr. Dodds: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many occupational therapists there were in each health and social services trust in Northern Ireland in each year since 1997. [113869]

19 May 2003 : Column 593W

Mr. Browne: Figures showing the number of occupational therapists there have been in each health and social services trust since 1997 are shown in the

19 May 2003 : Column 594W

following tables. Table 1 details headcount figures and Table 2 details whole-time equivalent figures.

Table l: Headcount figures for Occupational Therapists within each Health and Social Services (HSS) Trust in Northern Ireland in each year since 1997 ^(23),(24)

HSS Trust	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
Belfast City Hospital HSS Trust	18	18	20	23	25	24	27
Green Park Healthcare HSS Trust	28	31	31	37	36	34	39
South and East Belfast HSS Trust	40	45	43	44	41	41	46
Ulster Community and Hospitals Group HSS Trust	41	40	43	44	42	50	46
Royal Group of Hospitals HSS Trust	18	18	19	20	23	20	19
Mater Infirmorium Hospital HSS Trust	5	4	5	8	5	7	8
North and West Belfast HSS Trust	30	28	36	28	32	36	38
Down Lisburn HSS Trust	34	35	32	34	37	37	42
Causeway HSS Trust	19	18	19	19	18	20	28
Homefirst Community HSS Trust	68	75	76	85	91	91	95
Armagh and Dungannon HSS Trust	27	31	31	31	33	37	37
Newry and Mourne HSS Trust	18	16	18	18	23	23	24
Craigavon and Banbridge Community HSS Trust	26	30	31	38	40	45	50
Foyle Community HSS Trust	28	30	33	27	31	35	38
Sperrin Lakeland HSS Trust	26	25	28	29	31	31	33
United Hospitals Group HSS Trust	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Craigavon Area Hospital Group HSS Trust	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Altnagelvin Group HSS Trust	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Total	426	444	465	485	508	531	570

Table 2:Whole-time equivalent figures for Occupational Therapists within each Health and Social Services (HSS) Trust in Northern Ireland in each year since 1997 ^(23),(24)

HSS Trust	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
Belfast City Hospital HSS Trust	17.00	17.50	18.60	21.60	23.18	22.18	24.60
Green Park Healthcare HSS Trust	25.32	27.33	27.64	33.45	31.77	30.72	34.21
South and East Belfast HSS Trust	33.54	37.96	36.11	37.89	35.68	33.85	38.77
Ulster Community and Hospitals Group HSS Trust	36.73	33.96	36.41	37.47	33.46	41.46	39.15
Royal Group of Hospitals HSS Trust	17.51	17.50	18.05	19.05	22.05	18.95	17.95
Mater Infirmorium Hospital HSS Trust	5.00	4.00	5.00	8.00	5.00	7.00	8.00
North and West Belfast HSS Trust	26.72	24.52	32.41	25.60	29.48	31.63	32.64
Down Lisburn HSS Trust	28.48	29.63	27.04	28.77	31.15	31.32	37.04
Causeway HSS Trust	15.63	16.44	17.25	17.25	16.35	18.15	26.10
Homefirst Community HSS Trust	59.92	67.24	65.01	73.36	80.38	79.11	82.75
Armagh and Dungannon HSS Trust	24.39	28.05	27.27	27.33	28.00	30.04	29.58
Newry and Mourne HSS Trust	18.00	15.86	17.16	17.24	22.24	22.00	22.92
Craigavon and Banbridge Community HSS Trust	22.79	25.71	27.02	33.77	36.35	40.40	45.15
Foyle Community HSS Trust	25.67	28.28	30.83	24.64	29.05	32.88	34.98
Sperrin Lakeland HSS Trust	25.16	23.66	25.97	26.66	29.08	28.81	30.78
United Hospitals Group HSS Trust	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Craigavon Area Hospital Group HSS Trust	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Altnagelvin Group HSS Trust	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Total	381.86	397.64	411.77	432.08	453.22	468.50	504.62

⁽²³⁾ Bank staff have been removed from these figures.

⁽²⁴⁾ Figures are at March of each year.

---