Earl of Dalkeithasked the Minister of Housing and Local Government (1) whether he will seek to obtain from local authorities annual information concerning tree preservation orders, including such details as the number or acreage of trees involved in each order, the geographical location, and the amount of compensation paid, so that a complete record may be presented to Parliament each year in the form of a Command Paper;
(2) whether he will seek to obtain from local authorities as much detailed information as is possible concerning tree preservation orders made during the past five years; and if he will publish the results in a Command Paper.
§ Mr. Greenwood:The numbers of tree preservation orders made in England are published annually in the Department's Handbook of Statistics.
I propose to obtain information about the operation of the compensation provisions and I shall consider how this should be made available. The work involved in collecting other detailed information about tree preservation orders would not be justified.