§ Mr. SteenTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the annual budget for his departmental deregulation unit; how many staff it employs; and of these how many(a) are career civil servants and of what grades, (b) have been seconded from business, and (c) have experience of the private sector. [30060]
§ Sir Paul BeresfordThe deregulation initiative in the Department of the Environment is co-ordinated by two career civil servants, at grade 7 and higher executive officer level. Since it does not account for the whole of their workload, and all policy divisions devote resources to implementation of the initiative, it is not possible to define an overall annual budget. The deregulation unit in the Health and Safety Executive comprises one part-time 163W and four full-time career civil servants, at grade 7, senior executive officer, higher executive officer, executive officer and administrative assistant level, who work solely on deregulation matters. It does not have a separate budget.