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Sri Lanka

Mr. Llwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list the meetings held between his Department and the Sri Lankan Government in each of the past five years. [117516]

Mr. Ingram: The information is not available in the format requested. The British Defence Adviser Colombo and his staff meet regularly with representatives of the Sri Lankan Government and Ministry of Defence to discuss a number of issues. In addition, a number of MOD officials have met from time to time over the past five years with Sri Lankan Ministers and officials, both in the UK and in Sri Lanka.

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EDUCATION AND SKILLS

Teachers' Dress

Mr. Soames: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills if he will issue guidance on suitable dress for teachers. [119662]

Mr. Miliband: We have no plans to issue guidance on suitable dress for teachers.

MINISTER FOR WOMEN

Female GPs

Miss McIntosh: To ask the Minister for Women what action she has taken to ensure equality in the proportion of female GPs to male GPs in partnerships. [118503]

Mr. Hutton: I have been asked to reply.

Partnerships provide a legal framework within which general practitioners, as independent, self-employed professionals, organise themselves to provide general and personal medical services. The Government is committed to equality for female GPs and the new general medical services contract, if accepted, facilitates good human resource practice and improved working lives for all general practitioners, including a wider range of employment options.

CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

Conditional Fee Agreement

Mr. Kidney: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what assessment he has made of the benefits to the public of the new form of conditional fee agreement introduced by his Department on 2 June. [118709]

Mr. Lammy: The new form of conditional fee agreement (CFA) will for the first time enable people to enter into lawful agreement with their solicitor that in the event of winning the action the claimant will receive all of their damages and the solicitor will recover their reasonable fees from the losing party. People will have a clear choice between solicitors offering simple CFAs of this type and those offering other forms of CFA or funding arrangement. The simplified CFA is the first step in a programme the Government will be taking forward with key stakeholders including consumer groups to review and simplify the overall CFA regime. We would like to see a regime that it is easier for the consumer to understand and for solicitors to use and against which it is harder for mischievous challenges to be brought. The Government will be publishing a general consultation paper in the next few weeks and will be consulting widely to identify views and the specific actions needed.

Publicly Funded Legal Work

Mr. Llwyd: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs how many firms were franchised to carry out publicly funded legal work in 2000; and what the most recent corresponding figure is. [117525]

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Mr. Lammy: It is not possible to provide an answer to the question in the terms asked.

The Legal Aid Board's 'Legal Aid Franchise Quality Assurance Standard' (LAFQAS), which is also known as a franchise, was replaced by the Legal Services Commission's (Legal Services Commission) Specialist Quality Mark (SQM) in April 2002. All franchised organisations were passported through to the SQM level. Solicitors' offices can hold both a General Civil and Criminal contract under these standards.

As at 31 March 2000, 4,010 solicitors' offices and other organisations held franchises with the Legal Aid Board. As at 4 June 2003, 5,994 solicitors' offices and other organisations held the SQM.

Solicitors' offices accounted for the majority of these organisations.

LORD CHANCELLOR'S DEPARTMENT

Probate Office

Dr. Julian Lewis: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what assessment the Department has made of the effect on the workload of the Probate Office of wills being executed without professional advice. [119302]

Mr. Lammy: The Department does not keep records of the effect that proving home made wills has on the Probate Registries' workload.

It is the view of the Probate Registries that they get a similar amount of problems with professionally drawn wills as from home made wills.

Administration Orders

Mr. Colman: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department when the amendments set out in section 13 of the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 allowing wider use of Administration Orders at county court level to resolve cases of debt without recourse to bankruptcy will be implemented. [118426]

Mr. Lammy: The Government have concluded that section 13 will not be implemented in its current form, due to concerns over its feasibility. While some aspects of section 13, such as the three year time limit on orders, are welcome in that they would provide certainty for both debtors and creditors, its implementation would remove the current parameters to the scheme while not providing any safeguards, such as the opportunity to deal with physical assets and investigation into misconduct. The Government are consequently considering a wide range of options for reform in this area and will publish a paper on options for change later in the year. In the meantime, I refer my right hon. Friend to the White Paper "Effective Enforcement" issued by my Department in March 2003 for further details.

Lawyers Establishment Directive

Mr. Chope: To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department on what date each member of the European Union implemented the Lawyers Establishment

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Directive 98/5/EC; and what representations he has made about the continuing failure of France to implement it. [118221]

Mr. Lammy: The dates on which Directive 98/5/EC was implemented by the various states of the European Union are as follows:

	Date
Austria	23 May 2000
Denmark	7 April 2000
Finland	1 January 2000
Germany	14 March 2000
Greece	23 May 2000
Italy	18 January 2000
Spain	5 August 2001
Sweden	1 January 2000

Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Portugal have yet to complete formal implementation procedures. Neither France nor Ireland has yet embarked on the process.

Continuing representations made by and on behalf of the legal profession have, with the co-operation of the Paris Bar, secured certain of the benefits which associated with implementation of the Directive. In the light of this and of the action taken by the European Commission, before the European Court of Justice, the Government have taken the view that separate representations from them would not add anything at the present time; however we are continuing to monitor the position.

PRIME MINISTER

EU Constitution White Paper

Mr. Austin Mitchell: To ask the Prime Minister what plans he has to publish a White Paper on the EU constitution, setting out the Government's response to its proposals. [119113]

The Prime Minister: The Government intend to publish a White Paper on the future of Europe in advance of the Intergovernmental Conference which is due to start later this year.

G8 Summit

Mr. Caton: To ask the Prime Minister what measures are in place to ensure that the pledges made at the G8 summit are implemented. [119194]

The Prime Minister: G8 governments are collectively and individually responsible for the commitments that they make. Appropriate Government Departments will implement the actions agreed by the UK at the G8 summit in Evian.

Mr. Caton: To ask the Prime Minister what decisions were taken at the recent G8 Summit (a) to facilitate the transfer of technology to tackle HIV and (b) to improve water supplies in the developing world. [119195]

The Prime Minister: On technology to tackle HIV/AIDS, I refer my hon. Friend to my statement on the G8 Summit on 4 June 2003, Official Report, column 158.

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The G8 Summit adopted an Action Plan for Water, calling on the international community to redouble its efforts in the water sector. In all, 16 action plans and statements were released at the summit, copies of which have been placed in the House Libraries.

Honours

Andrew Mackinlay: To ask the Prime Minister how many residents of Thurrock have been awarded (a) OBEs and (b) CBEs in the past five years; and if he will make a statement. [118910]

The Prime Minister: Statistics on honours are not held on a district basis as my hon. Friend has requested.

Iraq

Lynne Jones: To ask the Prime Minister whether he has received a copy of the September 2002 report by the Pentagon Defense Intelligence Agency on Iraq's military capabilities. [118953]

The Prime Minister: We have access to intelligence from our allies but under exemption 1(c) of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information it is established practice not to disclose information received in confidence from foreign Governments.

David Winnick: To ask the Prime Minister if the Government will publish an account of the crimes against humanity carried out by the last regime in Iraq. [119474]

The Prime Minister: In December 2002 the Foreign and Commonwealth Office published "Saddam Hussein—Crimes and Human Rights Abuses", which documented the human rights record under Saddam Hussein's regime. Copies were made available in the House Libraries. It set out Saddam's record on torture, the treatment of women, prison conditions, arbitrary and summary killings, the persecution of the Kurds and Shia, the harassment of opposition figures outside Iraq and the occupation of Kuwait.

Since the fall of the regime, evidence has emerged, including for example the discovery of mass graves, revealing torture and killing by the regime.

We have always believed that those who have been responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes should be brought to justice and that the Iraqi people should play key role in bringing those responsible to justice, with international help.

The security of evidence, which may be linked to war crimes or crimes against humanity, is a priority. Coalition forces have been tasked with securing and protecting evidence of such crimes as they encounter it, to hand over to the relevant prosecuting authority at the appropriate time.

I have appointed Ann Clwyd MP as my Special Envoy to Iraq on Human Rights to look into this matter and report back to me with recommendations.

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