HC Deb 24 April 1989 vol 151 c654
91. Mr. Rooker

To ask the Minister for the Civil service how many civil servants have a legal qualification.

Mr. Luce

There are about 2,500 lawyers in the Civil Service.

Mr. Rooker

As only two of those lawyers are allocated by the serious fraud office to deal with the House of Fraser-Lonrho affairs and as one of them advised against and was overruled only by the assistant director, Ms. Chase, could we have a few more Government lawyers put on this case so that at least they can begin to get round to interviewing the leading protagonists? Obviously, with only two on the job, they have not got round to doing that.

Mr. Luce

I have enough questions to answer in the House and I will not be drawn into answering on the Lonrho case. Although we have had some success in recruiting lawyers for the Government legal service and the Crown prosecution service, we are still short of a large number.

Forward to