§ Mrs. BeckettTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his latest estimate of the amount of capital receipts spent by local authorities since the relaxation of rules concerning such receipts(a) in total and (b) in each local authority.
§ Mr. BaldryUnder the temporary relaxation in the rules, local authorities can spend 100 per cent. of virtually870W all capital receipts received during the period from 13 November 1992 to 31 December 1993. The receipts can be spent at any time. The information which authorities provide to my Department on the spending of their usable capital receipts relates to financial years; I am arranging for their latest returns to be placed in the Library of the House. On the basis of these returns, authorities provisionally estimated spending of usable capital receipts of about £1 billion in 1992–93 and are forecasting spending of £1.8 billion in 1993–94. It is not possible for my Department to estimate the proportion of these totals relating to receipts received during the relaxation of the rules.