| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2171W—continued
Citygate Public Affairs
David T.C. Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what meetings the Department has held with Citygate Public Affairs Ltd. since July. [36753]
Mrs. McGuire: The Department does not maintain a central list of such contacts. Ministers and civil servants, including special advisers meet many people as part of the process of policy development and business delivery. All such contacts are conducted in accordance with the requirements of the Ministerial Code, Civil Service Code, Code of Conduct for Special Advisers and Guidance for civil servants on contacts with lobbyists and people outside Government.
Compulsory Redundancies (Benefit Offices)
Keith Vaz: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will make a statement on negotiations with the Public and Commercial Services Union on compulsory redundancies for jobcentre and benefit office workers. [44840]
Mrs. McGuire: In November 2004 the Department reached a negotiated agreement with the PCS, FDA and Prospect trade unions. This agreement states that staff would only be declared compulsorily redundant after full and meaningful consultation with trade unions has taken place. The agreement allows for consultation to be undertaken at the appropriate level within the organisation and with a view to reaching agreement about ways to avoid, minimise or mitigate compulsory redundancy. DWP Management and the unions agreed to work constructively together to seek to avoid compulsory redundancies through redeployment and voluntary measures.
In accordance with the agreement, a forum of management and departmental trade unions has met monthly to review jointly the operation of the agreement. At the latest joint forum the unions agreed that the agreement was holding up well in the majority of government office regions. To date the Department has reduced staffing by just under 15,000 with only one compulsory redundancy, which involved exceptional circumstances. The Department will continue to work with its trade unions to avoid compulsory redundancy wherever possible.
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2172W
Credit and Benefit Overpayments
Greg Clark: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many individual credit and benefit overpayment cases have been referred to his Department by hon. Members since 2001. [40529]
Mr. Plaskitt [holding answer 11 January 2006]: Records prior to 2003 are no longer available.
Details of individual pension credit and benefit overpayment cases referred to the Department by hon. Members for the years 2003 to 2005 are shown in the following table.
| Number | |
|---|---|
| 2003 | 151 |
| 2004 | 220 |
| 2005 | 406 |
Customer Management System
Mr. Anthony Wright: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the estimated cost is of repairing the Customer Management System in his Department. [46829]
Margaret Hodge: The administration of Jobcentre Plus is a matter for the chief executive of Jobcentre Plus, Lesley Strathie. She will write to the hon. Member.
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has asked me to reply to your question asking what the estimated cost is of repairing the Customer Management System in his Department. This is something that falls within the responsibilities delegated to me as Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus.
The Customer Management System (CMS) is performing to agreed service levels so there is no repair cost as such. However, like all DWP Information Technology systems, CMS has a programme of future releases that will update and improve the system to reflect changing legislative and business requirements.
Debt Manager Software
Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how much debt has been written off as a result of problems with the new IT software package debt manager. [45278]
Mr. Plaskitt: No debt has been written off.
Departmental Advertising Campaigns
Anne Milton: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will list the public information advertising campaigns run by his Department in the past 12 months; and how much his Department spent on (a) newspapers and (b) television advertising for those campaigns. [42516]
Mrs. McGuire:
The information is not available in the format requested and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost. The information is held in financial years and the following table provides the figures for the current financial year to date.
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2173W
Notes:
1. All figures have been rounded to the nearest thousand.
2. All national advertising campaigns are listed together with the newspaper and television advertising expenditure relating to those campaigns. National advertising campaigns that do not include either newspaper or television advertising are also listed.
3. The information is not available in the format requested and has therefore been provided for the current financial year only.
4. All figures are exclusive of VAT.
Departmental Assets
David T.C. Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will list the items of departmental property worth over £100 that have been reported as (a) lost and (b) broken in the last 12 months. [47671]
Mr. Plaskitt: The information requested is as follows:
(a) Items of departmental property worth over £100 reported as lost from 1 January 2005 to 31 December 2005 are as follows:
(b) The Department does not hold details of property that has been broken.
Departmental Expenditure
Pete Wishart: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the annual expenditure on vehicles by (a) his Department and (b) each (i) non-departmental public body, (ii) executive agency and (iii) other public body for which he is responsible in (A) Scotland, (B) Wales, (C) each of the English regions and (D) Northern Ireland was in each of the last three financial years; and what the planned expenditure is for 2005–06. [39988]
Mr. Plaskitt:
The figures provided are for the department, all its agencies and non-departmental public bodies and cover vehicle purchase costs and car hire and associated running costs. The department does not collect centrally information in the agency or geographic format requested and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2174W
(43) Anticipated
Mr. Weir: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what expenditure on (a) buildings and (b) insurance of buildings and staff was by (i) his Department and (ii) each (A) non-departmental public body, (B) executive agency and (C) other public body for which his Department is responsible in (1) Scotland, (2) Wales, (3) each English region and (4) Northern Ireland in each of the last three financial years; and what the planned expenditure is for 2005–06 in each case. [40091]
Mrs. McGuire: A full response is not available from standard information systems in the format requested and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost. A partial response has therefore been provided.
(i) (a) (b) —The Department's estate has been sold or transferred under a PFI partnership deal to Land Securities Trillium (LST) and in return for the payment of a unitary charge, LST is responsible for providing a full facilities management service across the estate. As payments are made for the service as a whole the Department could provide a breakdown for the facilities, agencies and regions requested only at disproportionate cost.
(ii)(A)(a) (b) (c) —Listed as follows are the non-departmental public bodies which are not included in the PFI partnership deal with LST.
n/a = Not available.
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2175W
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2176W
15 Feb 2006 : Column 2177W
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |