§ Lord Lester of Herne Hillasked Her Majesty's Government:
How HMSO's price of £1.45 net per copy of the First Report of the Select Committee on Procedure 29WA of the House (HL Paper 8) was calculated, and what proportion of the price represents HMSO's profit; and
What is the cost of printing, publishing and distributing to members of the public each copy of the First Report of the Select Committee on Procedure of the House (HL Paper 8), in addition to the costs necessarily incurred in printing, publishing and distributing the report for members of both Houses of Parliament, government departments and other public authorities.
§ The Chairman of Committees (Lord Boston of Faversham)House of Lords Papers, along with other monochrome parliamentary publications, are priced using standard scales which determine a face value for items with a given page content and format. The scales aim to recover the overall costs of printing, publishing and distribution which are not recorded and assigned to individual titles. The scales also achieve an overall contribution to the financial targets set for HMSO by Ministers but, given the modest price of HL Paper 8, it is unlikely that sales revenue will be sufficient to recover costs in this case, particularly as demand for such specialised documents outside Parliament and Government is likely to be very small.