Written Answers to Questions
Wednesday 13 May 2009
Northern Ireland
Departmental Stationery
Sarah Teather: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much his Department has spent on branded stationery and gifts for (a) internal and (b) external promotional use in each of the last five years. [273788]
Paul Goggins: The costs requested for the Department, excluding its agencies and Executive NDPBs, in each of the last five years, are shown in the following table.
| £ | ||
| Internal | External | |
Community Safety Unit (CSU) accounts for around 50 per cent. of the costs. CSU purchased items to support campaigns that had been running from 2005-06, such as the domestic burglary campaign. CSU's 2008-09 costs relate more to Community Safety Week and ongoing community safety events rather than major campaigns, hence the fall in spend.
Scotland
Departmental ICT
John Thurso: To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland pursuant to the answer my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central (Jeremy Willott) of 24 April 2009, Official Report, column 978W, on departmental ICT, what recent discussions he has had with Scottish Executive Ministers on steps to reduce carbon emissions from ICT systems in his Department. [274903]
Ann McKechin: My officials are in regular communication with their counterparts in the Scottish Government about the information and communications technology system (SCOTS) which the Scotland Office shares with the Scottish Government. The Scottish Government are complying with the same standards as those set out in the Greening Government ICT Strategy.
Departmental Stationery
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how much his Department spent on the purchase of (a) recycled office supplies in the last 12 months and (b) printer ink cartridges in each of the last five years. [274572]
Ann McKechin: The Office does not record this information in the form requested.
Departmental Training
Mr. Hurd: To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what his Department’s policy is on the practice of holding departmental away days outside the Department’s buildings. [268538]
Ann McKechin: My Office has not laid down a policy on holding departmental away days outside the Department’s buildings. Occasional staff events off site are approved by the Director of the Scotland Office, when there is a clear benefit to the business to be gained. Whether Government or hotel accommodation is used, it must be fit for purpose and provide value for money taking account of the nature of the event.
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Blackwater Estuary: Pollution
Mr. Jenkin: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what research his Department has (a) commissioned and (b) evaluated on (i) the effects on the marine ecology of the Blackwater Estuary of chlorination of water inlet and outlet pipes at Bradwell power station, with particular reference to the native oyster population and (ii) changes to such effects arising from the construction of a new nuclear power station at Bradwell. [275213]
Huw Irranca-Davies: DEFRA has neither commissioned nor evaluated any such research. However, analysis of samples of cooling water discharges undertaken by the Environment Agency has not identified any significant issue regarding chlorine.
Detailed proposals for developing a new nuclear power station at Bradwell have yet to come forward. As a result, the Environment Agency is unable to comment on any potential changes on the marine ecology resulting from new construction at the site.
Common Fisheries Policy
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what recent discussions his Department has had with the European Commission on reform of the Common Fisheries Policy. [274609]
Huw Irranca-Davies: I exchanged correspondence with Commissioner Joe Borg of the European Commission on the reform of the common fisheries policy in April this year. I presented the UK’s early thoughts on reform of the common fisheries policy at the April Agriculture and Fisheries Council where the European Commission presented its Green Paper on reform of the common fisheries policy.
Departmental Training
Mr. Hurd: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what his Department’s policy is on holding departmental away days at locations other than departmental premises. [268464]
Huw Irranca-Davies: Each business area in DEFRA has a devolved learning and development budget which is used to fund locally arranged training for staff. This can include staff away days and team building exercises.
Managers have discretion to decide whether or not to hold away days and, if so, whether these should be held at locations other than departmental premises. In exercising this discretion, managers will be expected to ensure that value for money considerations are fully taken into account, and to evaluate all alternative options.
Fisheries: Expenditure
Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much was spent by the Marine and Fisheries Agency on fisheries enforcement in each of the last 10 years. [274279]
Huw Irranca-Davies: The Marine Fisheries Agency was created on 1 October 2005 and was renamed the Marine and Fisheries Agency on 1 April 2007, when it took on marine licensing responsibilities.
A summary of the expenditure on fisheries enforcement over the life of the agency to date is as follows. The figures for 2004-05 is a broad estimate from the comparative figures in the annual report and accounts.
| £ million | |
Recycling
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (1) what steps he has considered to increase levels of plastic and glass bottle recycling; if he will bring forward proposals to promote bottle return schemes in shops; and if he will make a statement; [273465]
(2) what measures he has considered to increase levels of plastic and glass bottle recycling; what consideration he has given to tax incentives for (a) companies who recycle, (b) companies who do not and (c) the promotion of bottle return schemes in shops; and if he will make a statement. [273380]
Jane Kennedy: The Government provide incentives and support for recycling by companies, for example through advisory services provided by the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP). In addition the landfill tax discourages landfill and encourages the recycling and recovery of wastes.
The Government also provide capital grant and other funding for the demonstration and pre-commercial deployment of low carbon and renewable energy technologies under the Environmental Transformation Fund, which has a budget of £400 million over the 2008-11 period. The Government also provide support for renewables through market drivers such as the renewables obligation, which is expected to be worth around £1 billion a year by 2010.
In December 2008 DEFRA published a report into packaging deposit systems and the role they might play in increasing recovery and recycling of single use drink containers (plastic, aluminium and glass) in the UK. The report was completed in consultation with a range of industry stakeholders and reviewed deposit systems in four other EU member states to assess the implications of introducing such a system in the UK.
The report concluded that while deposit schemes would increase recycling, alternative schemes could achieve the same or better results at a lower cost, as the relative cost of introducing a deposit scheme system was high. For example, the deposit scheme operating in Germany costs three times as much per container as a household collection system.
However, the Government are keeping an open mind in regard to deposit schemes and ‘reverse vending’, where vending machines take used bottles and cans for recycling and usually give a reward such as supermarket loyalty points or vouchers. A number of reverse vending systems are being set up by major retailers and the performance of these systems is being monitored.
Rivers: Pollution
Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many prosecutions for river pollution were brought by the Environment Agency in each of the last five years; and how many of those were successful. [274227]
Huw Irranca-Davies: The table shows the number of successful prosecutions for water pollution under section 85 of the Water Resources Act 1991 between 2004 and 2008. This information comes from the Environment Agency’s National Enforcement Database.
| Rivers | All controlled w aters( 1) | |||
| Total | Successful | Total | Successful | |
| (1) Under the Water Resources Act 1991, ‘controlled waters’ are defined as rivers, lakes, groundwaters or tidal and coastal waters up to three nautical miles out to sea. | ||||
House of Commons Commission
E-mail and Intranet
Mr. Drew: To ask the hon. Member for North Devon, representing the House of Commons Commission on how many occasions PICT has shut down the parliamentary (a) e-mail system and (b) intranet (i) wholly and (ii) partially in the last 12 months; and what the reasons for the shut-down were in each case. [273447]
Nick Harvey: The information is as follows:
(a) Mailboxes are stored on any one of five mail servers. The closure of any one of these servers would impact only on those users with mailboxes stored on it. Each server contains approximately 2,500 mailboxes. For the purpose of the answer, the closure of an individual server is reported as (ii) partially.
(i) The e-mail service has not been wholly shut down for the last 12 months.
(ii) The e-mail service has been partially shutdown on the following occasions in the last 12 months:
29-31 August 2008: 41 hours—one server failed due to software problems;
29-30 October 2008: 11 hours 30 minutes—one server failed due to software problems;
10-11 March 2009: 15 hours 30 minutes—one server failed due to a backup failure;
1 April 2009: Two hours 35 minutes—one server failed due to anti-virus scanner failure;
4 April 2009: All servers were down at some point during an eight hour period for security patch installation.
(b) (i) The Parliamentary intranet has been wholly shutdown on the following occasions during the last 12 months:
24 January 2008: 45 minutes due to a domain name service (DNS) failure;
29 February 2008: One hour and 30 minutes due to a proxy server service failure.
The Parliamentary intranet has also been unavailable due to planned maintenance on the following occasions:
21 March 2009: nine hours due to emergency security patch requirements
(ii) The Parliamentary intranet has not been partially shutdown during the last 12 months.
Mr. Drew: To ask the hon. Member for North Devon, representing the House of Commons Commission how many complaints the House authorities have received about the speed or reliability of the parliamentary (a) e-mail system and (b) intranet in the last 12 months. [273448]
Nick Harvey: All complaints are logged in PICT's case management system. There is no record of a complaint being made for either of the above items in the past 12 months. This answer does not cover complaints about unavailability of broadband or VPN which may have resulted in loss of access to email or the internet.
Chris Huhne: To ask the hon. Member for North Devon, representing the House of Commons Commission who the internet service provider is for the parliamentary IT system; and whether the (a) provider and (b) system will be subject to the provisions of the UK Data Retention (EC Directive) Regulations 2009. [272019]
Nick Harvey: The internet service provider for Parliament is Colt. The provisions of the UK Data Retention (EC Directive) Regulations 2009 apply to all public communications providers to whom a written notice has been given by the Secretary of State. I understand that Colt has not received such a notice.
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