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25 May 2004 : Column 1560W—continued
Computer File Formats
Mr. Allan: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what her Department's policy is in respect of the computer file formats used for the (a) distribution and (b) archiving of publicly available documents. [173365]
Ms Hewitt: Publicly available documents are distributed through the DTI websites predominantly in HTML and PDF to ensure that the information is as widely accessible as possible. On the main DTI website formal publications are available at http://www.dti.gov.uk/publications/.
We are proposing to archive and preserve electronic publications within the Department's electronic record and document management system in the format in which they were published. We will be reviewing this approach in discussion with the National Archives.
Democratic Republic of Congo
Norman Lamb: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what action she has taken in response to the report entitled Unanswered Questions, Companies, Conflict, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. [175552]
Mr. Mike O'Brien [holding answer 24 May 2004]: This report, which poses questions primarily based on the published UN reports, is being studied with interest. We have contact with Rights and Accountability in Development, the authors of this report.
Departmental Annual Report
Mr. Stephen O'Brien: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what the reasons were for the increase in the total net administration costs of her Department between 2002–03 and 2003–04 as set out in the Departmental Report 2004, Cm 6216, page 161. [171612]
Ms Hewitt: As is the standard approach, the 2004 Departmental Report provides an-actual outturn figure for 2002–03 and an estimated outturn figure for 2003–04. These two figures are not equivalent and cannot be compared directly. The actual outturn figure for 2003–04 will be published in the 2005 Departmental Report.
The actual outturn figure for 2003–04 was lower than estimated, mainly due to the generation of additional receipts, and some technical accounting adjustments. On an equivalent basis, the net administration cost for 2002–03, was £16 million higher than 2002–03, and this was awarded through Spending Review 2002. The reasons for this were an additional £8 million for front line services in the Employment Tribunals Service, ACAS and The Insolvency Service, £5 million for
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electronic Government IT services and an additional £3 million covering a range of activities across the Department.
Departmental Publications
Malcolm Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry pursuant to the answer of 10 May 2004, Official Report, column 79W, on departmental publications, if she will provide the information her Department holds centrally on the newspapers, magazines and periodicals for which it is responsible. [173962]
Ms Hewitt [holding answer 18 May 2004]: I am enclosing a list of serial publications as notified to my Department's Publications Unit. The list is of serial publications (excluding annual publications) that were produced between 1 April 2003 and 31 March 2004 and contains a brief description of each publication's subject matter.
25 May 2004 : Column 1562W
Discrimination Law
Mr. Stephen O'Brien: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many proceedings were brought by employees under discrimination law in each year since 1997 concerning (a) sexual orientation and (b) religious belief; and what estimate she has made of the number of such proceedings in 2004 to 2006. [175149]
Ms Hewitt: The Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003 and the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003 came into force on 1 and 2 December 2003 respectively. These Regulations give all workers a right to bring Employment Tribunal proceedings about discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, or religion or belief, a right which did not in general exist before.
In the period December 2003 to April 2004 there have been 30 Employment Tribunal applications registered by the Employment Tribunals Service relating to sexual orientation and 22 applications relating to religion or belief. These figures will be included with others in the Employment Tribunals Service's Annual Report, which is due to be published and laid before the House in mid-July.
In the Regulatory Impact Assessments prepared for the above Regulations, the DTI estimated that there would be around 1,000 applications a year relating to
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sexual orientation and around 1,000 applications a year relating to religion or belief.
Domestic Heating
Mr. Gregory Campbell:
To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what percentage of domestic
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properties in Great Britain are heated by (a) electricity, (b) solid fuel and (c) natural gas. [175857]
Mr. Timms: Information on the fuels used to heat domestic properties in Great Britain is published by BRE in its Domestic Energy Fact File. The latest available data relate to 2001, and are shown in the table.
| Main form of heating in 2001 (percentage) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Type of dwelling | Number of homes | Solid fuel heating | Electric heating | Gas heating | Oil heating | Other form of heating |
| Centrally heated | 22,030,000 | 3.02 | 10.78 | 79.79 | 4.29 | 2.12 |
| Non-centrally heated | 2,392,000 | 12.76 | 31.25 | 53.35 | 0.00 | 2.64 |
| All | 24,422,000 | 3.98 | 12.78 | 77.20 | 3.87 | 2.17 |
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