§ 76. Mr. Nichollsasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury if he will state in regard to the present position of Government offices how many Departments have been and eventually will be decentralised;
Department Numbers of Staff Involved Proposed Location Admiralty … 4,000 Bath Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries … 600 To be determined Air Ministry … 2,000–3,000 Gloucester Customs and Excise … 950 Southend Ministry of Education … 500 To be determined General Post Office … 13,000 Sheffield 1,550 Chesterfield General Register Office … 800 Southport Home Office … Up to 300 To be determined Inland Revenue … 1,500 Cardiff 2,400 Worthing Lord Chancellor's Department and Land Registry … 2,000 Durham Ministry of Pensions … 6,000 Blackpool Board of Trade … 550 To be determined Ministry of Transport … 250 Cardiff Department of Scientific and Industrial Research … Uncertain Hemel Hempstead Ministry of Civil Aviation … 1,700 To be determined Ministry of Food … 1,200 Guildford Ordnance Survey … 3,300 Wellingborough-Kettering Ministry of Supply … Not yet decided War Office … The numbers in all cases, and the locations in some, are still provisional, and most of the moves are not likely to take place for some time. The following moves have, however, already taken place: Ministry of Food to Guildford (700 staff), Inland Revenue to Worthing (212 staff). In addition, staff of the Admiralty, Ministry of Pensions and Inland Revenue are already, in varying numbers, at their long-term dispersal locations, these being the same as their evacuation centres during the last war.
§ 77. Mr. Nichollsasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury which Government Departments he has requested to consider the new towns in their plans for decentralisation; how many have expressed their willingness to move; and how many civil servants will be moved to the new towns.
§ Mr. JayThe Ministry of Civil Aviation is being asked to consider the possibility of moving between about 1,400 and 1,800 staff to Bracknell as an alternative to the earlier provisional choice of the Chalfont-Latimer area. It had also been agreed to move about 600 staff of the Ministry of Works Chief Scientific Adviser's branch to Hemel Hempstead, but this is being re-examined in the light of
206Wthe towns to which they will be moved; and the approximate number of civil servants moved to each town.
JayMr. The Departments involved in the Government's plan for the dispersal of Headquarters staff from the London area to the provinces are:
the transfer of the work to the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.