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5 May 2004 : Column 1634W—continued

Consumer Safety

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many people have (a) died and (b) been injured due to faulty or dangerous consumer goods in each year since 1994, stating the (i) product and (ii) manufacturer or retailer in each instance and (iii) the action taken by her Department. [169167]

Mr. Sutcliffe [holding answer 28 April 2004]: Home accident data do not distinguish unsafe products as such, nor the manufacturer or retailer of the products involved. However, research commissioned by the Department on a sample of 11,998 accidents in four
 
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separate years during the 1990s which included follow-up interviews with accident victims found that only 1.6 per cent. of fatal home accidents, 0.4 per cent. of serious injuries and 0.6 per cent. of minor injuries could be attributed solely to a fault with a product, including older products that had not been maintained or serviced properly or which had been used in a damaged condition. This represents approximately 60–70 home accidental deaths and 15,000.

Employment Rights Advice Booklets

Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry pursuant to the answer of 25 March 2004, Official Report, columns 962–63W, to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Lynne Jones), on employment rights booklets, at which of the three meetings of the practitioner group in June, July and October 2002 the members of the group were asked for their views on reducing the number of departmental employment rights advice booklets and leaflets in hard copy. [167281]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The practitioner group met on a number of other occasions. They discussed DTI reducing the number of publications available in hard copy on 19 June 2003.

Estate Agents

Claire Ward: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what plans she has to regulate estate agents. [170369]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The Department is currently considering the Office of Fair Trading report on estate agents, which includes recommendations about the future regulation of the industry. We aim to publish a response by 18 June 2004.

EU Enlargement

Keith Vaz: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assessment she has made of the likely effectiveness of the new competition system in Europe after enlargement. [168971]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The new EC Regulation on Competition was drafted with the specific objective of ensuring effective application of competition law across the EU after enlargement. The Commission is committed to reporting on the effectiveness of the new regulation five years after it comes into effect. Both the Commission and the European Competition Network will be monitoring the effectiveness of the new competition system on an on-going basis.

Keith Vaz: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how consistency in compliance with new competition rules in Europe will be ensured across the EU after enlargement. [168972]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The National Competition Authorities of all member states are represented on the new European Competition Network which is working to ensure that the new EC Regulation on Competition is applied consistently. The Commission always has the option of taking up any case in which it feels that the ECN are not operating appropriately.
 
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Keith Vaz: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what the new competition system in Europe is doing to protect small businesses in local communities from being forced to close as a result of competition from larger businesses. [168973]

Mr. Sutcliffe: There are prohibitions on anti-competitive agreements and the abuse of dominance in competition law at both the EC and UK level. Through these prohibitions, competition law provides remedies to protect all businesses, including small businesses in local communities, from anti-competitive trading practices.

EU Social Chapter

Mr. Wyatt: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will make a statement on the effects of the EU Social Chapter on the residents of Sittingbourne and Sheppey. [170295]

Mr. Sutcliffe: The residents of Sittingbourne and Sheppey have benefited from the EU Social Chapter by having their employment rights extended to include:

the right to Parental Leave which gives parents the right to 13 weeks unpaid leave at the birth or adoption of a child;

the entitlement of part-time workers to the same pro-rata terms and conditions of employment as full-time workers, thereby removing any discrimination and improving the quality of part-time jobs;

the provision that once a prima facie case has been made in an employment tribunal claim, the burden of proof is placed on the defendant (usually the employer), who will need to demonstrate that sex discrimination has not occurred;

rights under the Fixed Term Work Directive that provide equal treatment and prevent abuse of fixed term contracts;

rights under the European Works Council Directive which requires companies with at least 1,000 employees in total and at least 150 workers in each of the two member states, to establish structures for consulting workers on issues that affect them and;

In addition, the Information and Consultation of Employees Directive to be implemented in the UK by March 2005, establishes a right to new minimum standards for workforce communication and involvement in large firms.

Export Licences

Sir Menzies Campbell: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will list the UK arms export licences to Indonesia approved in 2004. [169153]

Nigel Griffiths: Since 1997 the Government has published an Annual Report on Strategic Export Controls containing details of all UK export licences by destination.

Details of export licensing decisions taken in 2004 will be recorded in the 2004 Report.

Family Friendly Employment Laws

Mr. Best: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assessment she has made of the impact of family friendly employment laws in the past 12 months. [170286]

 
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Mr. Sutcliffe: The DTI has collected evidence from a number of sources to help in assessing the impact of the new employment laws which came into force in April 2003.

Between December 2002 and April 2003 fieldwork was carried out for two DTI Work-Life Balance studies. Data was collected from employers and employees to provide a baseline for future evaluation of the impact of the new flexible working law. Details of the results can be found at www.dti.gov.uk/er/emar.

In the first six months after implementation, CIPD and Lovells conducted research into flexible working which indicated that over a quarter (28 per cent) of employers had seen an increase in the total number of requests since April 2003. Seven in ten of the employers surveyed said they were willing to consider flexible working requests from all staff—not just those with children under six. 68 per cent. of employers believed that the opportunity to work flexibly had a positive effect on employee attitudes and morale. Full results are at www.cipd.co.uk.

The Department commissioned questions on flexible working over a number of months in the Office of National Statistics Omnibus survey. The data was collected between September 2003 and February 2004. The results demonstrated that in the last year, around 900,000 parents have asked for a change in their working hours, equating to a quarter of all parents with children under six.

Eight out ten often (77 per cent.) of those requests were granted in full, with a further one in ten (nine per cent.) partly accepted, or a compromise reached.

Since April 2003, the proportion of flexible working requests being declined has nearly halved—from 20 per cent. before April 2003 to 11 per cent. after, which suggests that the regulations have increased employers' willingness to consider requests seriously. The full report is available at www.dti.gov.uk/er/inform.htm.

Data on the impact of the changes to maternity pay and leave, as well as paternity and adoption pay and leave will become available in the summer, extracted from PAYE returns to Inland Revenue due in May.

The Department continues to work with key intermediaries, such as Working Families and Maternity Alliance, to gather evidence through member/supporter surveys. It has also organised a series of roundtable events, currently being held around the country, which are engaging with parents and employers directly. The findings from this ongoing work will feed into the evidence base for a review of the impact of the legislation in 2006.

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