§ Mr. MilburnTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how many parliamentary answers have been refused on the grounds of disproportionate cost or information not being held centrally(a) as a total and (b) as a percentage of all answers in each of the last five years.
§ Mr. SackvilleI refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) and the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) on 12 December 1994,Official Report, columns 470–71 for information on replies stating that information is not held centrally for the 1989–90 to 1993–94 sessions. A search on POLIS has shown that, up to 26 January, 50 questions have been replied to in this form which is 3.7 per cent. of replies given so far in the 1994–95 Session.
Information on disproportionate costs replies is shown in the table.
Session Number Percentage of total answered 1989–90 11 0.24 1990–91 21 0.68 1991–92 5 0.33 1992–93 38 0.64 1993–94 42 0.83 1994–951 7 0.52 Source: POLIS. 1To 26 January 1995.