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Road Safety

Mr. Peter Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many (a) fatal and (b) non-fatal accidents, broken down by their road classification, there were in each of the past three years. [122539]

Angela Smith: The table outlines the number of fatal and non-fatal accidents in Northern Ireland in each of the past three years. It should be noted that the information on road classification is not available, a breakdown is however provided by rural and urban areas based on speed limits.

Road Traffic Injury Collisions by Road Type: NI 2000—2002

	Fatal Collisions	Serious Collisions	Slight Collisions	Total Collisions
2000
Roads in Urban Areas	46	639	4532	5217
Roads in Rural Areas	103	636	2432	3171
Total	149	1275	6964	8388
2001
Roads in Urban Areas	36	602	3847	4485
Roads in Rural Areas	101	639	2222	2962
Total	137	1241	6069	7447
2002
Roads in Urban Areas	37	506	3492	4035
Roads in Rural Areas	99	599	2051	2749
Total	136	1105	5543	6784

Schools

Mr. Dodds: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many incidents of vandalism against school property occurred in (a) North Belfast, (b) Belfast and (c) Ireland; and what the total cost was in each area, in each year since 2000. [127422]

Jane Kennedy: The cost of vandalism met by each Education and Library Board in controlled and maintained schools in each financial year since 2000 is as follows:

£

Education and Library Board	2000–01	2001–02	2002–03
Belfast	356,250	485,000	292,000
Western	62,958	42,263	53,623
North-Eastern	272,036	286,121	226,994
South-Eastern	189,741	248,122	69,449
Southern	78,286	133,708	140,713
Total	959,2 71	1,195,214	782,729

The computerised system currently operated by the 5 Education and Library Boards is being upgraded at this time and information on the number of incidents of vandalism in schools and on the cost of such incidents is not available at present. The information on North

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Belfast schools is also not available at this time. I will write to the honourable member when this information becomes available.

Secondments

Annabelle Ewing: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what his Department's policy is on employing secondees from the private sector; how many secondees from the (a) private and (b) public sectors his Department employed in each year since 1997; from which companies and organisations they were seconded; at what level they were employed; and if he will make a statement. [127061]

Mr. Pearson: This response covers both the Northern Ireland civil service and the Northern Ireland Office.

Policy on inward secondments is set out both in the Northern Ireland Civil Service Commissioners' Recruitment Code and in the GB equivalent. Inward secondments are generally used to meet particular business needs, for example where there is a shortage of skills or expertise to undertake particular work.

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In addition, both the Northern Ireland civil service and Northern Ireland Office participate in interchange schemes. These recognise the value of interchange for skills transfer and staff development, and facilitate staff exchanges with the private, voluntary and wider public sectors.

Since 1997 there have been 37 secondments from the private sector and 185 from the public sector to the Northern Ireland civil service. There were no secondments from the private sector and 38 from the public sector to the Northern Ireland Office during the same period. A breakdown is provided in the tables which have been placed in the Library.

Sick Leave (Health Professionals)

Mrs. Iris Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many days of sick leave was taken in the last 12 months by (a) doctors, (b) nurses, (c) other health care professionals and (d) other employees in each health trust. [124520]

Angela Smith: The number of sick leave days taken in the last 12 months up to and including 30 June 2003 by (a) doctors, (b) nurses (c) other health care professionals and (d) other employees in each health trust is as follows:

Health and social services trusts	Doctors	Nurses	Other health care professionals	Other employees
Altnagelvin Hospitals Trust	1,100	10,867	2,171	17,430
Armagh and Dungannon Trust	297	8,581	1,824	10,871
Belfast City Hospital Trust	997	23,297	7,976	18,883
Causeway Trust	70	16,678	3,197	24,684.5
Craigavon Area Hospital Trust	733.4	9,018.4	2,546.1	9,788.1
Craigavon and Banbridge Community Trust	143.8	3,505.7	977.6	11,368.3
Down and Lisburn Trust	352	14,712	3,281	29,254
Foyle Trust	80.8	8,886.2	1,620.7	19,244.2
Greenpark Trust	86	12,291.9	2,639.9	3,385.7
Homefirst Community Trust	532	15,464	3,202	40,991
Mater Infirmorum Trust(10)	310	4,771.8	941.21	6,532.94
Newry and Mourne Trust	158	10,326	4,470	(11)9,937
North and West Belfast Trust	183	8,698.1	5,953.9	37,160
Royal Group of Hospitals Trust	951.5	25,905.4	8,341.4	47,270.4
South and East Belfast Trust	230.8	13,509.6	6,786.5	19,068.4
Sperrin Lakeland Trust	324.9	20,804.5	2,359.5	19,767.7
Ulster Community and Hospitals	511.1	21,468.2	12,498.9	26,176.4
United Hospitals Trust	770	19,111	4,189	23,107
Northern Ireland Ambulance Service(12)	n/a	n/a	9,047.38 (hours)	701. 88 (hours)

⁽¹⁰⁾ Period 1 April 2002 to 31 March 2003.

⁽¹¹⁾ This figure does not include community care assistants.

⁽¹²⁾ The Northern Ireland Ambulance Service was only able to provide information in hours due to the shift pattern worked by employees. The figures provided are for year ending May 2003.

Mrs. Iris Robinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many general practitioners in Northern Ireland are on sick leave from work. [124521]

Angela Smith: Not all GPs report when they are unable to attend work due to sickness. The total number of GPs on sick absence is therefore not known. As at 30 June 2003, the Central Services Agency is aware of 18 general practitioners absent from their practice due to sickness and is paying for the employment of locums.

Smoking

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many smoking rooms the Northern Ireland Civil Service maintains; how frequently staff are permitted to attend to smoke; for what length of time; at what cost; and if he will make a statement. [126161]

Mr. Pearson: There are some 158 smoking rooms currently in operation in the Northern Ireland Civil Service and NIO within the general office estate.

Although no central guidance has been issued on the frequency or length of absences permitted in order to use smoking rooms, line managers are required to ensure that any individual cases of abuse of the facility are identified and dealt with quickly.

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As use of smoking facilities is at management discretion and the cost of providing and maintaining the smoking rooms is not identified separately from other accommodation costs the cost of this facility could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

The NICS has been trying to encourage staff to give up smoking through its Workplace health Improvement Programme. This programme is designed to raise awareness of a range of health issues, including smoking, and offers practical advice to encourage staff to adopt/maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Car Parking (Stormont)

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many Stormont estate car parking spaces there are; how many such spaces have been built since 1995; how much parkland he plans to use for car parking spaces; and what his policy is on the growth of car parking provision on the estate. [126162]

Mr. Pearson: There are approximately 2500 car parking spaces within the Stormont Estate. Around 400 of these are adjacent to Parliament Buildings and are for the use of Assembly members, staff and visitors. The remaining 2100 are used by civil servants working on the Estate, together with visitors and contractors. This total includes spaces designated for use by people with disabilities and for visitors. No extra spaces have been created since 1995 apart from 25 temporary spaces provided recently but the opportunity is currently being taken to upgrade a redundant builder's compound to provide an additional 70 parking spaces. Any further development for parking will be dependent upon decisions on the implementation of the recommendations in the recently completed Accommodation Review.

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