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20 Apr 2009 : Column 58W—continued
D-Day Landings: Anniversaries
Mr. Streeter: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what steps his Department plans to take to assist veterans to commemorate the 65th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy. [269012]
Mr. Kevan Jones: It has been the policy of successive Governments that special commemorations are only initiated by the Ministry of Defence for key anniversaries and centennials of events of the greatest national significance. Other anniversaries do not receive MOD sponsorship at public expense.
I understand that the French Government are arranging an international commemoration in France to mark the D-Day anniversary. Ministers and Service Chiefs are keen to become involved in these events and await official invitations.
In the region of 1,000 members of the armed forces will be in Normandy in June, as many are each year and current members of units which fought on D-Day will stand alongside veterans at wreath laying ceremonies in France.
The Big Lottery Fund have recently agreed to pay travel costs for veterans wishing to attend the commemorations this year and those who have already arranged their own travel will also be reimbursed.
Finally, in the UK the Normandy Veterans Association (NVA) are holding their own wreath laying ceremony at the Cenotaph in London on Sunday 21 June, accompanied by the band of the Welsh Guards, and to follow that we are working with the NVA on the possibility of a church service.
Defence: International Co-operation
Dr. Fox: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for North Devon of 25 March 2009, Official Report, column 426, on defence: international co-operation, what steps have been taken to increase interoperability between countries (a) operating aircraft carriers and (b) with naval vessels able to support carrier operations. [269163]
Mr. Hutton: The Royal Navy regularly identifies opportunities at the tactical and operational level to increase interoperability with foreign navies.
The European Carrier Group Interoperability Initiative (ECGII) draws together European nations with operational
aircraft carriers or with naval vessels capable of supporting carrier operations. This initiative seeks to improve interoperability between European navies for national, NATO or EU-led operations. The inaugural Steering Group for ECGII met in Paris on 18 March 2009.
The UK Carrier Strike Group Commander and his staff regularly liaise and train with the US Navy at both a tactical and operational level. The UK also has a Long Lead Skills programme with the US Navy, which is developing essential personnel skill-sets in advance of the arrival of Carrier Vehicular (Future).
It is routine procedure for warships of close allies to integrate into each others Carrier Strike Group deployments, as demonstrated last year with the integration of the US, French and Spanish warships into the RN’s Orion 08 deployment led by HMS Illustrious, and HMS Manchester's integration into the US Carrier Strike Group.
Departmental Buildings
Mr. Hunt: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what (a) grade II, (b) grade II* and (c) grade I listed buildings have been owned by his Department in each of the last three years. [266858]
Mr. Kevan Jones [holding answer 26 March 2009]: I will place in the Library of the House a current list of the Department’s listed buildings and details of those that have been disposed of, and thus removed from the list, or added in 2007 and 2008. The list is broken down by grade and devolved Administrations as listed building grades differ between each Administration.
Departmental Computers
Mr. Hoban: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many laptop computers have been provided to (a) Ministers, (b) special advisers and (c) civil servants in his Department in each year since 2005; and at what cost. [268267]
Mr. Quentin Davies: Information relating to the number, cost and distribution of all laptop computers purchased by the MOD since 2005 is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Departmental Copyright
Ann Winterton: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many staff work in his Department’s Intellectual Property Rights Directorate employs; and what the Directorate’s (a) expenditure and (b) income was in each of the last five years for which figures are available. [268778]
Mr. Quentin Davies: The Defence Intellectual Property Rights (DIPR) Directorate employs 35 staff.
The expenditure and income figures for the DIPR budget are as follows:
| £ | |||
| Expenditure | Total income | Adjusted income | |
The expenditure covers DIPR staff costs, in meeting MOD Intellectual Property (IP) project support work (national and international), and includes the costs of staff seconded from DIPR to the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl). The expenditure also includes costs to fund IPR activities such as IPR protection (patents, trade marks, registered designs) and for meeting the legislative requirements including managing and monitoring of Classified Patent Applications.
Total income is the total payments directly into the DIPR budget, including payments from Dstl to cover the seconded staff and DIPR outgoing costs paid on behalf of Dstl. This income excludes IP income such as levies and royalties which are credited to other MOD budgets. Adjusted income is the total payments into the DIPR budget, excluding payments from Dstl.
Ann Winterton: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the cost of administering Defence Crown Copyright was in each of the last five years; and how much was received in copyright fees in each such year. [268779]
Mr. Kevan Jones: The costs of administering Defence Crown Copyright during the last five years were as follows:
| £ | |
The external income received from licensing Defence Crown Copyright during the last five years were as follows:
| £ | |
Departmental Energy
Greg Clark: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what steps have been taken by (a) his Department and (b) its agencies to improve the thermal efficiency of their buildings in the last 12 months. [266755]
Mr. Kevan Jones:
In addition to complying with all applicable building regulations, Ministry of Defence construction projects are mandated, through the Office of Government Commerce Common Minimum Standards and the Sustainable Operations on the Government Estate Mandates, to undertake building research
establishment environmental assessment method (BREEAM) or defence related environmental assessment methodology (DREAM) environmental performance assessments. DREAM assessments in particular encourage performance over and above that of building regulations in the area of energy efficiency.
Of those assessments completed since DREAM was launched in March 2006, 75 per cent. have achieved a greater than 10 per cent. improvement against the building regulations and six per cent. have achieved a greater than 20 per cent. improvement.
In addition there is a Departmental commitment that from 2008 all new service families accommodation in the UK will meet level 3 of the code for sustainable homes.
Greg Clark: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what recent progress his Department has made towards the target of increasing its energy efficiency per square metre of its Estate by 15 per cent. by 2010, relative to 1999-2000 levels; and if he will make a statement. [266883]
Mr. Kevan Jones: The Ministry of Defence (MOD) did not report energy per square metre before 2004.
In 2006-07 following improvements in data quality, the MOD recalculated the building floor area used to measure performance against the Sustainable Development in the Government target of 15 per cent.
The latest assessment of Government’s performance against these targets was published by the Sustainable Development Commission on 12 December 2008:
These show the MOD reduced energy consumption by per square meter by 10 per cent. since 2006-07.
Departmental Health Insurance
Nick Harvey: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much his Department has spent on private medical contractors in each of the last five years. [269272]
Mr. Kevan Jones: The vast majority of health care for service personnel is provided by the Defence Medical Services or the national health service. However, there will be times when it is necessary to employ private medical contractors, such as when a particular specialism is not readily available, or when it would be impractical to provide the service overseas using internal resources (for example, aspects of health care for personnel posted overseas to Germany and other smaller bases and detachments).
In practice, such private sector health provision is funded by a number of individual budgets across the MOD, including at local unit level within the single Services, and disproportionate effort would be required to provide the total Departmental spend.
However, we have been able to obtain a breakdown of costs from the MOD Central Budget and British Forces Germany which indicates the sums involved and services contracted. This information is provided in the following tables.
| MOD central budget | |
| Financial year | £ |
These figures include contract costs for the provision of in-patient mental health provision, specialist prosthetic services, and civilian locums for operational deployments.
| British Forces Germany | |
| Financial year | £ |
These figures include secondary health care contracts with German hospitals; non-contracted extra-contractual costs for specialist care; primary care contract costs with SSAFA Forces Help and Guy's & St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust (i.e. not all private contractor provided); non-contracted primary care costs; and costs related to Isolated Detachments in European Theatre.
Departmental Mobile Phones
Mr. Hoban: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much has been spent on (a) the purchase of and (b) bills for (i) BlackBerrys and (ii) other mobile telephones for (A) Ministers, (B) special advisers and (C) civil servants in his Department in each year since 2005. [268250]
Mr. Quentin Davies: The amount expended by the MOD on Blackberrys and mobile telephones, in each financial year since 2005, is shown in the following table.
| Financial year | Spend (£ million) |
It represents the combined spend on devices (Blackberrys and mobile telephones), accessories, rental charges and usage charges for all MOD users including Ministers, special advisers, civil servants and members of the armed forces. It has not been possible to identify separately the costs for Blackberrys and mobile telephones, or to show separately the costs for each group due to the complexity of the management data and the form in which it is held. This information could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
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