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17 Dec 2008 : Column 832Wcontinued
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster with reference to the answer of 5 November 2008, Official Report, columns 492-3W, on charities: bank services, if he will place in the Library the background information on the charities. [241673]
Kevin Brennan: I am unable to place this information in the Library as the details of the charities affected were given to us in confidence on the basis that they would not be made public. Some organisations have expressed concern about the reputational risk of disclosing information about their investments and I am obliged to respect their confidence. The right hon. Member will be aware that a new charity action group, called Save Our Savings (SOS), has been formed to represent charities that have deposits at risk with Kauthpthing, Singer and Friedlander Limited. The Save Our Savings campaign is led by Cats Protection and Naomi House Childrens Hospice.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster with reference to the answer of 5 November 2008, Official Report, columns 492-3W, on charities: bank services, what the names of the 46 charities are. [241674]
Kevin Brennan: I am unable to provide the names of the charities affected as they were given to us in confidence on the basis that they would not be made public. Some organisations have expressed concern about the reputational risk of disclosing information about their investments and I am obliged to respect their confidence. The right hon. Member will be aware that a new charity action group, called Save Our Savings (SOS), has been formed to represent charities that have deposits at risk with Kauthpthing, Singer and Friedlander Limited. The Save Our Savings campaign is led by Cats Protection and Naomi House Children's Hospice.
Mr. Leech: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster how many registered UK charities have been investigated by the Charity Commission in consequence of allegations of links with terrorist organisations in each year since 2001. [241809]
Kevin Brennan: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the Charity Commission. I have asked the Commission to reply.
Letter from Andrew Hind, dated 12 December 2008:
As the Chief Executive of the Charity Commission, I have been asked to respond to your written Parliamentary Question on charities with alleged links to terrorism.
As you will understand, this aspect of our work is of a highly sensitive nature. We are limited in the amount of information we can provide, as we have to ensure that we do not prejudice our ongoing operational work and also the work being carried out by law enforcement and other agencies. Charities are not always aware of allegations of terrorist links so we do not publish statistics about the number of investigations or cases of this nature.
The Commission has powers to conduct formal, statutory inquiries under section 8 of the Charities Act 1993. Where we are able to, it is now our policy to publish reports stating the results of these inquiries. We also responded publicly in connection with the Home Office review and consultation in May 2007 on safeguarding the charitable sector from terrorist abuse. We were able to confirm that at that time the Commission had concluded 16 investigations relating to charities facing allegations of connections to terrorist activity over the past ten years. These included for example, the inquiry into Finsbury Park Mosque, where we removed Abu Hamza from his position at the mosque.
An example of a recent inquiry report which included issues of alleged links to terrorism is the inquiry into the UK Tamils Student Union (published 2007). Another is the report on Al Ikhlas Foundation, (published in October), which is still available via our website at www.charitycommission.gov.uk under inquiry reports.
Furthermore, we have begun annually to publish a report on the work of our compliance teams (who deal, among other issues, with cases involving alleged links with terrorism). The first of these reports, Charities Back on Track, was published earlier this year. It explains that of the 42 statutory inquiries reports that we published last year, one was related to allegations of links to terrorism. Charities Back on Track is also available on our website and I will arrange for a copy to be placed in the House of Commons library.
I hope this is helpful.
Alan Duncan:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what proportion of invoices for goods and services procured from small and medium-sized
businesses were paid within 10 days of receipt by No. 10 Downing Street in (a) 2006-07 and (b) 2007-08; and if he will make a statement. [243357]
Kevin Brennan: The Prime Minister's Office is an integral part of the Cabinet Office and therefore the answer provided is for the whole of the Cabinet Office including the Prime Minister and his office.
The Cabinet Office system is not set up to identify the size of a business.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster with reference to the answer of 11 November 2008, Official Report, column 1131W, on written questions, if he will place in the Library a copy of the standard Cabinet Office intranet (Cabweb) guidance on answering round robin Parliamentary Questions. [241904]
Kevin Brennan: A copy has been placed in the Library.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster how much funding Futurebuilders has written off in total in relation to the charity Catz Club. [241591]
Kevin Brennan: The Futurebuilders Fund is managed by Futurebuilders England Ltd. (FBE) under contract to the Cabinet Office and all Futurebuilders investment decisions are made by FBE.
FBE invested a total of £1,536,000 in Catz Club, which consisted of a capital grant of £170,000 and a loan of £1,366,000. The total funding written off by FBE in relation to the charity Catz Club is £841,979.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what consideration the Futurebuilders Advisory Panel has made of the funding given by Futurebuilders to the charity Catz Club. [241593]
Mr. Byrne: The Futurebuilders Advisory Panel was an advisory non-departmental public body established in March 2005 to provide independent advice to Ministers on the Futurebuilders programme. As part of the rationalisation of advisory bodies in the Office of the Third Sector, the Futurebuilders Advisory Panel held its last meeting on 1 April 2008.
The terms of reference of the panel were to:
Advise on progress, effectiveness and future developments relating to the (Futurebuilders) Fund;
Scrutinise and evaluate the activities of the Fund; and to
Influence the development of the Fund.
The Advisory Panel did not consider individual investment decisions made by Futurebuilders England Ltd.
Mr. Maude: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster with reference to the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood, (Mr. Hurd) of 28 October 2008, Official Report, column 16W, on Catz Club, for what reasons Futurebuilders decided to terminate its relationship with Catz Club. [241888]
Kevin Brennan: I refer the right hon. Member to the answer given to him on 24 November, Official Report, column 1124W.
Mr. Ellwood: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what definition of long-term unemployed is used to produce statistics on long-term unemployed people; and how those statistics are calculated. [244068]
Kevin Brennan [holding answer 16 December 2008]: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the authority to reply.
Letter from Karen Dunnell, dated 16 December 2008:
As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question, asking what definition of long-term unemployed is used to produce statistics on long-term unemployed people; and how those statistics are calculated. (244068)
Official estimates of unemployment are derived from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). They are calculated in accordance with the definition agreed by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), that is, people are unemployed if they are without a job, want a job, have actively sought work in the last four weeks and are available to start work in the next two weeks, or if they are out of work, have found a job and are going to start it in the next two weeks.
The duration of unemployment is measured in terms of calendar months and years and relates to the length of time looking for work, and the length of time since the respondents last job.
The ONS has no official definition for long-term unemployment. However, for the LFS, long-term unemployment is usually regarded as unemployment with a duration of one year or more.
Under the National Statistics Socio-economic Classification (NS-SEC) there is a category for long-term unemployed but users must decide their own definition, according to their research purposes.
Jenny Willott: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what the (a) employment and (b) unemployment rate for (i) women, (ii) men and (iii) men and women aged (A) 16 to 24, (B) 25 to 34, (C) 34 to 49 and (D) 50 to 60 years was in each month of the last 10 years. [241444]
Kevin Brennan: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the authority to reply.
Letter from Karen Dunnell, dated December 2008:
As National Statistician. I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question asking what the (a) employment and (b) unemployment rate for (i) women, (ii) men and (ill) men and women aged (A) 16 to 24, (B) 25 to 34. (C) 34 to 49 and (D) 50 to 60 years was in each month of the last 10 years. (241444)
The attached table provides estimated employment and unemployment rates for the categories requested, for each quarter since 1998. Monthly data is not available.
The estimates are derived from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). As with any sample survey, estimates from the LFS are subject to a margin of uncertainty.
The figures have been derived from the LFS microdata which are weighted using the official population estimates published in autumn 2007. Consequently, the figures from quarter 3 2006 are not entirely consistent with the figures published in the monthly Labour Market Statistics First Release which are weighted using more up-to-date population estimates.
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