§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service if it is her policy that all publications by Her Majesty's Stationery Office should be published at an"economic price", that is, without subsidy from other publications of Her Majesty's Stationery Office publications; and what estimate he has made of the effect of this on the cost of the Official Report.
§ Mr. HayhoeThe policy aim is that the publishing business of Her Majesty's Stationery Office should not be subsidised by other Her Majesty's Stationery Office activities, but it would be quite impracticable to apply this policy to each of the thousands of separate publications issued by the office each year. TheOfficial Report is accounted for quite separately and receives a direct subsidy from Voted funds to compensate Her Majesty's Stationery Office for the inescapable loss which is incurred in producing it overnight to the tight timetable required.
§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service what instructions she has issued to Her Majesty's Stationery Office in regard to tendering for reprographic work for such public bodies as local authorities and nationalised industries.
§ Mr. HayhoeThe reprographic units of Her Majesty's Stationery Office are all at liberty to undertake work for such organisations in order to take up immediately spare capacity.
§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service if she proposes to run down the reprographic services at present provided by Her Majesty's Stationery Office; if so, how many redundancies would result; and what saving in cost there would be to Government Departments.
§ Mr. HayhoePresent plans are for the withdrawal of Her Majesty's Stationery Office from the operation of common service reprographic units outstationed in other Government Departments, and for a reduction in service to offset a fall in demand. It is too early to say how many staff will be surplus or what the savings will be.
§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service what steps have been taken to permit Government Departments to purchase such goods and services from private firms as were formerly supplied by Her Majesty's Stationery Office; and if he will make a statement on untying.
§ Mr. HayhoeSince the establishment of a trading fund for Her Majesty's Stationery Office the traditional arrangements for the tying of Departments to Her Majesty's Stationery Office for supplies of stationery and printing have been reviewed, and Departments are now free to purchase books from commercial booksellers. Beyond this, there will not be any general relaxation of tying before 1 April 1982. I am, however, devising arrangements with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment for the immediate untying of about one-third of Her Majesty's Stationery Office342W publishing and procurement for his Department. We believe that this will help to test the efficiency of Her Majesty's Stationery Office by providing comparative cost information.
In addition, four other Departments—Industry, Trade, Defence, and Agriculture, Fisheries and Food—will be free in certain limited areas to withdraw business from Her Majesty's Stationery Office before 1 April 1982 if they can show, on an equitable comparison of costs, that there is advantage to themselves, no intolerable detriment to Her Majesty's Stationery Office and no overall damage to the Exchequer interest or the objectives of public purchasing policy.
During 1981 Her Majesty's Stationery Office will seek to reach an agreement with each of its customers on the range of goods and services which will be obtained from Her Majesty's Stationery Office from 1 April 1982. The agreements will indicate any specific types of business which Departments propose to withdraw from Her Majesty's Stationery Office. The agreements will be assessed in draft to ensure that the overall interests of the Exchequer are not damaged and that, taken together, they do not create unreasonable difficulties for the efficient operation of Her Majesty's Stationery Office as a Government trading fund.
§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service what representations she has had from private publishing companies that they should be invited to tender for work at present carried out by Her Majesty's Stationery Office.
§ Mr. HayhoeNone.
§ Mr. John Garrettasked the Minister for the Civil Service whether he has made any estimate of the effect of the untying of Government purchases from Her Majesty's Stationery Office on employment in Her Majesty's Stationery Office, Norwich.
§ Mr. HayhoeI would expect the stimulus to efficiency provided by untying to enable Her Majesty's Stationery Office to sustain a higher level of business and thus provide a sounder basis for employment than would otherwise be the case with cuts in Government purchasing and manpower.