Mr. Hague:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recommendations the Cabinet Office review of the UK's civilian expert capability made in relation to the operation of his Department; and what steps are being taken to implement them. [253957]
David Miliband:
The Cabinet Office Review of the UK's civilian expert capacity, agreed by National Security, International Relations and Development Overseas and Defence sub-committee Ministers on 21 January 2009, recommended enhancing the role of the Cross-Departmental Stabilisation Unit jointly managed by the Department for International Development (DFID), the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and the Ministry of Defence (MOD), to allow it to become the primary Government delivery unit for deploying high quality civilian experts, as part of improving the overall effectiveness of our deployable civilian capability. An implementation team, drawn from the FCO, DFID and the MOD is being established to take forward the review's recommendations, including the proposal to transfer the management of secondments to multilateral missions, such as the EU and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, from the FCO to the Stabilisation Unit.
23 Feb 2009 : Column 368W
Mr. Hague:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs pursuant to the answer of 21 January 2009, Official Report, column 1519W, on armed conflict: reconstruction, if he will place a copy of the Cabinet Office review of the UK's civilian expert capability in the Library. [253964]
David Miliband:
The recommendations of the Cabinet Office Review into Stabilisation and Civil Effect were presented to Ministers as a Cabinet Sub-Committee Paper. The Cabinet Office has advised that this paper should not be placed in the Library. Information relating to the proceedings of Cabinet Committees, including Cabinet Committee papers, is generally not disclosed as to do so could be prejudicial to the formulation of policy through full and frank discussion.
Departmental Correspondence
Mr. Hancock:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many letters received by his Department more than (a) one month and (b) three months ago have not been answered. [255495]
Gillian Merron:
The information requested is as follows:
(a) 121
(b) 4
Departmental Databases
Mrs. Laing:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what the cost of maintaining the databases owned and managed by (a) his Department and (b) its agencies was in (i) 2006, (ii) 2007 and (iii) 2008. [256150]
Gillian Merron:
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) resource accounts record the following consolidated administration expenditure on all IT and communications in the past three financial years:
£ million
2007-08
114.643
2006-07
78.959
2005-06
109.797
These figures include expenditure by the FCO’s two agencies (FCO Services and Wilton Park), and covers all non-capital costs, including communications, incurred in the provision of data to staff worldwide.
Departmental Freedom of Information
Mr. Hancock:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what the cost to his Department of replying to requests made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 in (a) 2006, (b) 2007 and (c) January to July 2008 was. [255680]
Gillian Merron:
A report prepared for the Ministry of Justice by Frontier Economics Ltd., in October 2006, entitled “Independent Review of the impact of the Freedom of Information Act” estimated a figure of £254 for a central Government body to deal with an initial freedom of information request. Based on this 23 Feb 2009 : Column 369W
figure, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has spent an estimated £805,434 since 2006.
The report is available on the Ministry of Justice website at:
Grant Shapps:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs which websites are operated by his Department in addition to its main website; and what the operating budget for those websites is. [251405]
