HC Deb 27 October 1980 vol 991 cc187-9W
Mr. Rooker

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will make a statement detailing any reduction or abolition in the collection or publication of statistics or reports by his Department since May 1979, indicating if such information is available from any other source and what financial savings have been made by any such changes.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin:

The information requested is as follows: The following returns and reports have been abandoned, reduced in scope or delayed since May 1979: Collection of unit information on personal social services staff: halved in any one year (September 1979). Abandonment of 1979 local authority planning statement (October 1979). Abandonment of "one-week meals" return SSDA 301 (November 1979). Omission of information on individual admissions and discharges from local authority and voluntary residential homes: returns RA2 and RA3 (March 1980). Abandonment of "Mother and baby homes" return SSDA 106 (March 1980). Reduction of information collected on registers of the blind SSDA 902 (March 1980). Reduction of information collected about adult day centres SSDA 512 (March 1980). Simplification of information collected about aids for the disabled SSDA 305 (March 1980). Curtailment of distribution of the report on the 1978 local authority planning statements (Summer 1979). Abandonment of an ad hoc enquiry on boarding out allowances (May 1979). Cessation by the Department of the analysis of nutrition surveys (the analysis of these surveys outside the Department continues). Abandonment of the analysis of the 1978 family expenditure survey to establish the uptake of supplementary benefit and welfare foods, and the numbers with incomes below or within a given percentage of the supplementary benefit level. Abandonment of returns on pre-registration student, etc., nurses and midwives (similar figures are collected by the General Nursing Council and the Central Midwives Board). Production of the central medical recruitment committee index (of doctors employed in Great Britain) has been abandoned for 1978 and 1979. Processing of information or distinction awards, and on the medical staff of the universities, has been delayed. The sample size for the collection of statistical data relating to sickness benefit, injury benefit, invalidity benefit, noncontributory invalidity pension and housewives' non-contributory invalidity pension has been reduced from two per cent. to one per cent. Cessation of returns for the statistical analysis of regional health authorities' strategic plans. Abolition of the mid-year count of general medical practitioners' patients. Abolition of the return on vacant posts in the community dental service. Simplification of the quarterly return on chemists' shops opening and closing. Abandonment of the Department's annual report, which contained a range of summary statistical information. The publication of "Health and Personal Social Services Statistics" for 1979 was delayed.

The financial savings from the above are estimated to be about £150,000.