§ Mr. SteenTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many compulsory inquiries are issued by the Central Statistical Office to small firms each year; how many Prodcom quarterly inquiries are sent out to small firms each year; and what is the estimated total cost of these inquiries to(a) each small business and (b) the Exchequer. [41548]
§ Mrs. Angela KnightInformation on the number of forms to the level of detail requested is currently held only for those inquiries included in the interdepartmental business register. Out of a total of 663,000, 304,500 forms were sent to businesses with fewer than 25 employees between July 1994 and June 1995. Some 1,170 small firms with fewer than 25 employees were included in the Prodcom quarterly inquiry, resulting in 4,680 forms in that year.
In July 1995 the Central Statistical Office took over responsibility for the former Employment Department's employer surveys. Including the inquiries conducted by the former Employment Department, there were in total 537W some 1,743,000 forms sent to businesses in the 1994 calendar year. This figure includes an estimate for the former Employment Department's biennial census of employment based on an average of the number of forms sent out for that inquiry in 1993 and 1994. The 1994 costs on the same basis were estimated at £22 million to business and £23 million to the Exchequer. Information which would enable a breakdown of these costs between smaller and larger businesses is currently not available in respect of all the inquiries. The Central Statistical Office is in the process of developing a compliance plan which will provide more detailed breakdowns of the costs of all the inquiries. This will be available in April 1996 and a copy placed in the House of Commons Library.