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10 Jun 2010 : Column 214W—continued

Prison Service: Manpower

Mr Anderson: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many prison service staff of each Civil Service grade were employed at each prison in each of the last three financial years. [1227]

Mr Blunt: Information on the number of staff employed in each Prison Service establishment in the last three years has been placed in the Libraries of the House.

Probation Officers: Manpower

Mr Llwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many probation staff at each grade were employed by (a) Greater Manchester Probation Trust, (b) Merseyside Probation Trust, (c) Staffordshire and West Midlands Trust in the West Midlands area and (d) Wales Probation Trust in South Wales on the most recent date for which figures are available. [1833]

Mr Blunt: The latest available staff in post figures at 30 September 2009⁽¹⁾ are shown in the following table. The Staffordshire/West Midlands and Wales mergers did not take place until April 2010, so are shown as separate areas in the table.

10 Jun 2010 : Column 215W

10 Jun 2010 : Column 216W

Number
Job group	Greater Manchester	Merseyside( 1)	Staffordshire	West Midlands	Dyfed Powys	Gwent	North Wales	South Wales
Area/district manager	13.00	0.00	3.00	27.00	2.00	1.00	9.00	14.59
Assistant chief officer	11.00	7.00	0.00	16.60	0.00	5.00	3.00	5.00
Chief officer	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00
Deputy chief officer	3.00	2.00	2.00	4.70	2.00	0.00	0.00	2.00
Middle manager	39.60	55.44	26.61	106.98	16.30	17.50	6.40	54.73
Other operational staff	143.26	0.00	7.17	68.48	2.00	21.76	19.82	13.29
Other staff	1.57	0.00	0.00	3.00	3.41	2.00	6.60	9.00
Practice development assessor	4.00	3.00	1.50	7.60	0.60	0.00	0.00	4.60
Probation Officer	340.87	207.23	131.90	355.12	35.10	73.14	64.00	132.62
Probation services officer	258.63	225.97	86.44	400.59	44.50	55.43	50.86	171.25
Psychologist	0.00	0.00	0.00	1.00	0.00	0.00	1.00	0.00
Senior practitioner	73.92	0.00	0.00	3.50	0.00	0.00	12.21	0.00
Support staff administration	319.04	126.52	95.66	398.93	34.30	57.63	53.78	109.23
Support staff-other	33.50	58.03	30.79	43.56	16.49	10.42	12.11	31.44
Trainee probation officer	49.92	29.00	0.00	23.00	13.00	8.00	17.00	15.00
Treatment manager	17.01	4.00	0.00	10.20	1.80	4.00	0.00	1.00
Not recorded	0.00	1.00	0.00	1.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Total	1,309.32	720.19	386.07	1,472.26	172.50	256.88	256.78	564.75
(1 )Merseyside Probation Trust were unable to submit data to the HR Data Warehouse in September or August 2009 due to local staffing issues. The figures provided for Merseyside are therefore at 30 July 2009.

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Ascension Island

Mark Lancaster: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he expects the discussions between his Department and the Ministry of Defence on the budget for Ascension Island to be concluded. [1797]

Mr Bellingham: The budget for Ascension Island is set by the Governor of the Island on the advice of the Ascension Island Council and the Government; not by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office or the Ministry of Defence.

Departmental Press: Subscriptions

Chris Bryant: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what newspapers, magazines and other periodicals are provided for each (a) Ministerial and (b) official's office in his Department; and at what annual cost those publications are provided. [1098]

Alistair Burt: As new ministerial teams are in place the following information reflects our monthly position as of May 2010 (the latest information available) and our requirement may be subject to further change.

My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary's Private Office and Special Advisers receive the following papers and periodicals Monday to Friday, or when published, at a cost of £762.44 per month: Daily Mail x three, Daily Telegraph x four, Financial Times x three, Guardian x four, International Herald Tribune x two, The Sun x four, The Times x four, Spectator, Private Eye.

My hon. Friend Henry Bellingham's Private Office receives the following newspapers and magazines Monday to Friday or when published, at a cost of £150.50 per month: The Times, The Independent, The Guardian, Daily Mail, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph and two copies of The Economist.

My hon. Friend Jeremy Browne's Private Office receives the following newspapers and magazines Monday to Thursday or when published, at a cost of £161.34 per month: Financial Times, The Times, Telegraph, Guardian, The Mail, International Herald Tribune, Independent, The Sun, Mirror, The Express, New Statesman, Economist, The Spectator.

My hon. Friend David Lidington's Private Office receives the following papers and periodicals Monday to Friday, or when published, at a cost of £129.86 per month: Financial Times, The Times, The Independent, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Daily Mail, Daily Express, The Sun, Daily Mirror.

My noble Friend the right hon. Lord Howell's Private Office receives one copy of the following papers and periodicals Monday to Friday, or when published at a cost of £124.70 per month: The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Times, the Financial Times, the Economist and New Statesman.

My Private Office receives one copy of each of the following papers Monday to Thursday at a cost of £104.55 per month: Financial Times, The Times, The Independent, The Telegraph, The Sun, Daily Mirror, Daily Mail, The Guardian.

We do not have a central record of these requirements covering the offices of officials and there would be a disproportionate cost involved in obtaining this information.

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Israel: Nuclear Weapons

Caroline Lucas: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reports he has received of the documents uncovered by Sasha Polakow-Suransky regarding Israel and possession of nuclear weapons; whether he has had discussions with the Israeli Government on this matter; and if he will make a statement. [1301]

Alistair Burt: We are aware of press reports but have had nothing to substantiate these claims. We have not had any discussions with the Israeli Government regarding this matter.

Middle East: Armed Conflict

Nicholas Soames: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what assessment the Government has made of whether the linkage made by the government of Israel between access for aid and reconstruction materials and the refusal of Hamas to renounce violence constitutes collective punishment of the people of Gaza within the meaning of the Fourth Geneva Convention; and if he will make a statement. [1192]

Alistair Burt [holding answer 7 June 2010]: Israel states that it has imposed the blockade in self-defence given its conflict with Hamas. Blockading a coastline to prevent supplies reaching the enemy is a legitimate military measure. But there are limits. One of these is that the damage to the civilian population is not expected to be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated from the blockade.

My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary made clear in his statement to the House on 2 June 2010 that it is essential that there be unfettered access not only to meet the humanitarian needs of the people of Gaza, but to enable the reconstruction of homes and livelihoods and permit trade to take place. The Foreign Secretary also raised this in his conversation with the Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

The UK will continue to press the Israeli Government to lift Gaza's closure and to discuss these issues urgently with our international partners.

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