§ Mr. Arthur Lewisasked the Minister for the Civil Service whether, taking account of the numbers switched to the Post Office and other similar types of strictly non-Civil Service departments, he will give for the latest and most convenient date the total number of civil and public servants and their salaries and how these figures compare with October 1974.
§ Mr. Charles R. MorrisI can answer only for the Civil Service. The total number of civil servants in post at 1st October 1974 was 687,200. At 1st October 1977, after taking account of the transfer into the Civil Service of some 20,800 staff of the Manpower Services Commission and its agencies, staff-in-post numbered 741,300. This figure had been reduced by 1st April to 735,700, a fall of some 12,000 over a period of two years.
The provision taken for 1974–75 in the Main and Supplementary Estimates for Civil Service pay was £1,599 million and in 1977–78 it was £2,565 million.