§ Mr. Nigel EvansTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made in establishing the social and statistics division of the Department of Finance and Personnel as a next steps agency. [23319]
§ Sir John WheelerThe social and statistics division of the Department of Finance and Personnel, including the census office and general register office, will be established as an executive agency on 1 April 1996. It will be known as the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency.
I have set a number of key performance targets for the agency to achieve in its first year. These are as follows:
- 85 per cent. of key Government users of the agency surveyed rating its overall service as satisfactory or better;
- 80 per cent. of registered non-Government users of the agency surveyed rating its overall service as satisfactory or better;
- to produce at least 40 statistical publications;
- to process 95 per cent. of general register office postal and personal applications within eight and three working days respectively;
- to reduce by 2 per cent. the unit cost of producing certificates by the general register office;
- to achieve a minimum 3 per cent. efficiency saving.
Copies of the framework document, which sets out the terms within which the agency will operate, will be placed in the Library, along with its first corporate and business plan.