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TRADE AND INDUSTRY

Company Accounts

Brian Cotter: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what estimate she has made of the number of public limited companies which failed to disclose details of their payment records in annual accounts as required by company law in the last year for which figures are available; and what steps she is taking to tackle this. [167506]

Mr. Sutcliffe: This information is not collated centrally and, as there are over 12,000 public limited companies, it could be gathered only at disproportionate cost.

Where Companies House receives a complaint that a public company has not disclosed its policy and practice as required by the Companies Act 1985, then it will take enforcement action.

Consumer Codes Approval Scheme

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (1) what steps the Office of Fair Trading have taken to inform consumers of the Consumer Codes Approval Scheme; how much the scheme has cost; and how much of the costs have been spent on advertising and information campaigns; [165496]

(2) which organisations the Office of Fair Trading has granted Stage One approval to in the Consumer Codes Approval Scheme; and from which organisations Stage 1 approval was withheld; [165497]

(3) what evidence the (a) Ombudsman for Estate Agents, (b) Direct Selling Association, (c) Association of British Travel Agents and (d) Vehicle Builders and Repairers Association supplied in support of their application to the Consumer Codes Approval Scheme; and if she will make a statement on the Stage 2 award to each organisation; [165498]

(4) what proportion of their respective industries the membership of the (a) Ombudsman for Estate Agents, (b) Direct Selling Association, (c) Association of British Travel Agents and (d) Vehicle Builders and Repairers Association represent; and what assessment she made of these proportions before granting Consumer Codes Approval Scheme Stage 2 approval. [165499]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Office of Fair Trading is responsible for the day-to-day administration of the Consumer Codes Approval Scheme. I will ask the Chairman to write to the hon. Member.

Employment Rights

Jim Dobbin: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many residents of Heywood and Middleton qualify for paid leave entitlements. [168532]

Mr. Sutcliffe: All workers resident in Heywood and Middleton qualify for paid annual leave entitlements; at least four weeks as set out in the Working Time Regulations. While all women are entitled to 26 weeks ordinary maternity leave, only those who meet the eligibility criteria will be able to claim statutory maternity pay for that period.
 
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All employees in Heywood and Middleton who are eligible will be entitled to take statutory paternity leave with pay and statutory adoption leave with pay.

Jim Dobbin: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many residents of Heywood and Middleton have benefited from a reduction of the maximum working week to 48 hours. [168533]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Working Time Regulations provide workers with the right to refuse to work more than 48 hours on average, if they do not want to. Numbers for Heywood and Middleton are not available. However, it has been estimated that around 300,000 workers resident in the North West stood to benefit from the introduction of the weekly working time limits in 1998.

James Purnell: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will make a statement on the effect on residents of Stalybridge and Hyde of new rights for night-shift workers. [168743]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Working Time Regulations came into force on 1 October 1998. The regulations limit working time to 48 hours per week averaged over a 17-week reference period. For night workers the limit is eight hours per day on average, including overtime where it is part of a night worker's normal hours of work. There is no opt-out from the night working time limit.

Night workers are entitled to 11 hours rest between working days, one day's rest per week, and a 20-minute in work rest break if the working period is longer than six hours.

All night workers should be offered a free health assessment before they start working night and thereafter at regular intervals for as long as they are working nights. The health assessments should take account of the nature of the work and the restrictions on a worker's working time under the regulations. Workers who suffer from problems as a result of working at night, should as far as practicable be offered alternative day work.

All workers are entitled to four weeks paid annual leave. There is no specific data available for night shift workers in Stalybridge and Hyde.

Estate Agents

Mr. Bailey: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how her Department plans to respond to the Office of Fair Trading report on estate agents. [165907]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Department is now considering the report's findings and recommendations and we aim to publish our response by 18 June 2004.

In the interim, my officials will be meeting estate agents groups, consumer groups and other interested parties during the 90-day period to help inform our response.

Funeral Directors

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many funeral directors are practising in the United Kingdom. [168663]

 
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Ruth Kelly: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

Letter from Len Cook to Malcolm Bruce, dated 27 April 2004:

As National Statistician I have been asked to reply to your recent question concerning the number of businesses which are classified as funeral directors and related services. (168663)

The latest available information is published in the National Statistics bulletin "PA1003—Size Analysis of United Kingdom Businesses for 2003" which shows that there were 525 businesses in the UK in the category of funeral directors and related services in March 2003.

The bulletin is available free of change on the National Statistics website at: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/pal 003.

National Minimum Wage

Mr. Best: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what estimate she has made of the number of young people in Leeds who will benefit from the introduction of the minimum wage for 16 to 18-year-olds. [167778]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Government recently accepted the Low Pay Commission's recommendation that 16 and 17-year-olds should be covered by a new National Minimum Wage of £3.00 per hour, from October 2004.

It is not possible to provide an estimate specifically for Leeds because of small sample size. However, the number of people in the UK who stand to benefit from the new rate is likely to be in the low 10s of thousands.

Mr. Pike: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many workers in Burnley have benefited from the national minimum wage. [167895]

Mr. Sutcliffe: It is not possible to provide estimates specifically for the constituency of Burnley. However, based on the Office for National Statistics' Low Pay data released in 2003, the DTI estimates that around 140,000 people in the North West stood to benefit from the introduction of the National Minimum Wage in April 1999. Between 130,000 and 160,000 people were expected to have benefited from the October 2003 up-rating of the National Minimum Wage.

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will list the (a) name, (b) industry, (c) number of employees and (d) geographical locations of those employers formally issued with enforcement notices for not complying with the national minimum wage provisions. [166751]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Inland Revenue have issued 495 enforcement notices against employers, since the minimum wage was introduced in April 1999.

A breakdown of information is not available in the   format you have requested. For reasons of confidentiality, the Inland Revenue does not reveal the identity of the names of employers.

We will be writing to the hon. Member with further details.

Helen Southworth: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many workers in Warrington South have benefited from the national minimum wage. [168704]

 
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Mr. Sutcliffe: It is not possible to provide estimates specifically for the constituency of Warrington South. However, based on the Office for National Statistics' Low Pay data released in 2003, the DTI estimates that around 140,000 people in the North West stood to benefit from the introduction of the National Minimum Wage in April 1999. Between 130,000 and 160,000 people were expected to have benefited from the October 2003 uprating of the National Minimum Wage.

James Purnell: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many workers in Stalybridge and Hyde have benefited from the national minimum wage. [168745]

Mr. Sutcliffe: It is not possible to provide estimates specifically for the constituency of Stalybridge and Hyde. However, based on the Office for National Statistics' Low Pay data released in 2003, the DTI estimates that around 140,000 people in the North West stood to benefit from the introduction of the National Minimum Wage in April 1999. Between 130,000 and 160,000 people were expected to have benefited from the October 2003 up-rating of the National Minimum Wage.

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