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Written Ministerial Statements Thursday 18 September 2003

TRANSPORT

London Underground

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. Tony McNulty): London Transport's (LT) expenditure on external consultancy in relation to the Public Private Partnership (PPP) for the modernisation of London Underground (LU) has been regularly reported to the House at six-monthly intervals since 13 January 1999.

LT's liabilities transferred to Transport for London (TfL) on 15 July 2003, so some residual final costs are being met by London Underground (LU) in TfL's ownership. The total consultancy costs concerned, from 20 March 1998 (the date of the Government's announcement of the PPP) up to the end of August 2003, is £103.16 million. The potential final cost is £103.5 million. Once all related expenditure has been paid I will report the final costs to the House.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

Sanctions

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Bill Rammell): As of today's date, the United Kingdom implements mandatory UN sanctions, imposed by the UN Security Council acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, in relation to Al Qa'ida and the Taliban, Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Iraq, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Somalia. UN sanctions in relation to Angola (UNITA) and Libya were lifted on 9 December 2002 and 12 September 2003 respectively. The full trade embargo and all-encompassing asset freeze in relation to Iraq have been lifted. But an arms embargo remains and UNSCR 1483(2003) placed a ban on trade in stolen cultural property and requests Member States to freeze and transfer certain Iraqi assets to the Development Fund for Iraq. The United Kingdom implements, in addition, sanctions imposed by the European Union in relation to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burma, China, Democratic Republic of Congo, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (former President Milosevic and the persons associated with him continue to represent a threat to the consolidation of democracy in the area of the former Republic of Yugoslavia), Libya, Sudan and Zimbabwe. In accordance with a decision of the OSCE, the United Kingdom implements arms embargoes on Armenia and Azerbaijan. The UK has imposed a unilateral arms embargo adopted by national legislation on Iran and a ban in relation to the sale of certain equipment to the armed forces of either side on the island of Cyprus. A list of sanctions regimes

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implemented by the UK is in the Library of the House. Annexed to this is a summary of additional UK restrictions on the export of strategic goods. These documents are also available on the FCO website at http://www.fco.gov.uk/sanctions and are updated each time there are changes to sanctions regimes implemented by the UK, or to UK restrictions on the export of strategic goods.

British Terrorist Victims

The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Jack Straw): Last week we remembered the victims of the 11 September terrorist attacks, two years ago. In a few weeks, we shall be marking the first anniversary of the Bali bombings. The Government responded to these tragic events with practical support for the families of the victims beyond the consular assistance we would normally provide following the death or injury of British nationals abroad. We did so because of the exceptional nature of terrorism, in which individuals are random victims of attacks directed at society as a whole. I am announcing today a package of measures designed to support the families of victims of future terrorist attacks abroad, which is based closely on what was provided for the families of victims of 11 September and Bali.

Those measures are:

Return economy airfares to the airport nearest the site of the incident for two members of the victim's family.


Accommodation for three to five nights.


Travel insurance as appropriate and where available.


Local Travel including transfers from airport to local hotel.


Repatriation of bodies or remains.


Immediate medical expenses of those killed or injured.


Medical evacuation of those killed or injured to the nearest hospital.


Return luggage costs of those killed or injured.

The provision of the exact package, and the details of the assistance offered to the families will, of course, depend on the particular circumstances, including whether any of the costs are already covered by existing insurance policies. As a matter of course, we provide consular advice and support, both in London and at the site of the incident. We also endeavour to arrange insurance cover for family members where it would not otherwise be available.

None of these measures can ever take away the pain and suffering which families will experience in these most horrendous of circumstances, but we sincerely hope they will at least remove some of the practical and administrative burdens from them when trying to cope with the trauma of the incident.

The question of what constitutes an act of terrorism remains a difficult one. In the case of 11 September, Bali and the compound bombings in Riyadh in May of this year, we were all in no doubt that we were dealing with acts of terrorism. Where there is doubt as to whether a violent death abroad is the result of an act of terrorism, we will consider the circumstances carefully and sympathetically. In essence, this package of measures is designed to assist the families of

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members of the travelling and expatriate British public, who are inadvertently caught up in a terrorist incident; and where they are not covered by ordinary insurance policies.

FCO/TUC International Advisory Council

The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Jack Straw): The FCO has been working to strengthen co-operation with British unions on issues of mutual interest overseas As economic decisions are increasingly made in a global context, so British trade unions are more involved with international organisations and counterparts overseas. British trade unions have long played a wider international role in helping promote, among other things, democracy and human rights.

To identify areas of concern and to facilitate discussion, the General Secretary of the TUC and I have agreed to set up an FCO/TUC international advisory council This Council will be led from the Foreign Office side by the Minister for Europe and will include participants from both the FCO and the trade union movement.

To brief interested parties on this expanded co-operation, the FCO and TUC agreed to produce a leaflet setting down in practical terms how British unions and the FCO are working together. This leaflet was circulated to delegates at the TUC General Congress last week. Copies of the leaflet, which have been placed in the Library of the House, will also be circulated to our embassies abroad and will be available on the FCO website http://www.fco.gov.uk/.

ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS

Rural Payments Agency

The Minister for Rural Affairs and Local Environmental Quality (Alun Michael): The 2002–03 Annual Report and Accounts for the Rural Payments Agency will be laid today and copies will be place in the Libraries of both Houses.

HEALTH

Dentistry

The Minister of State, Department of Health (Ms Rosie Winterton): Subject to the will of Parliament, the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill will give primary care trusts new duties for commissioning local national health service dental services. Primary care trusts will have a duty to secure the provision of primary dental services either through contracts with individual practices or by providing services themselves. With these new responsibilities, the £1.2 billion currently held centrally for funding dental services will pass to primary care trusts.

Until then, we will continue to work with the NHS and the dental profession to support NHS dentistry and to reform it to meet local needs. I am today announcing additional funding of £65.2 million to support change and help improve access, quality and

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choice for patients. The funding will be targeted at those primary care trusts where access is a real problem and will be on top of the £1.2 billion which is currently held centrally and which will in time go to primary care trusts.

The £65.2 million will be used as follows:

£35 million to enable primary care trusts to improve access, choice and quality for patients;


£30 million for information technology to integrate dentistry within the national information technology programme;


£200,000 to develop dental leadership skills within strategic health authorities and primary care trusts to support them with the dental change agenda.

This funding comes on top of the £9 million announced last month for the NHS support team that has been set up to work with those areas where it is hardest to find an NHS dentist and a further £1 million to help primary care trusts, local dental committees and dentists to prepare for the change in the way dental services are commissioned.

There are many examples of excellent NHS dental services and we want to reward NHS dentists and make practice in the NHS an attractive option. The programme of reform we are now embarked on will enable the NHS, dentists and patients to influence local services in the future.

As well as the changes flowing from the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill, we have also asked Harry Cayton, the director for patient experience and public involvement at the Department, to undertake a review of patient charges for NHS dentistry. This review involves patient groups and other stakeholders and will be reporting to Ministers by April 2004.

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