§ Mr. Alan SimpsonTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, pursuant to his answer of 9 February 1999,Official Report, columns 202–03, on export licences to Indonesia, for what reason the number of ML1 standard individual export licences listed for 1997 and 1998 was fewer than the number reported in the answer to the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Mrs. Clwyd) of 8 April 1998, Official Report, columns 345–46. [80012]
§ Dr. HowellsMy hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Mrs. Roche) referred in her answer of 8 April 1998,Official Report, columns 345–46, to her earlier answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) on 30 October 1997, Official Report, columns 870–71, in which she had said that information derived from the Export Control Organisation's computer databases should be treated as indicative only because of problems that had been identified in them; and that new checking procedures had been introduced and would be backdated to cover information recorded since 2 May 1997.
The discrepancy to which my hon. Friend draws attention arose because one export licence which actually only covered electronic goods with a rating of ML11 was found to have been recorded on the databases with ratings of ML11 and ML1. This error was corrected before I gave my answer of 9 February 1999, Official Report, columns 202–03; and that correction is the reason for the discrepancy. It did not affect the total number of licences or the number of licences with a rating of ML11 in either Answer.
The information contained in the recent Annual Report on Strategic Export Controls may be treated as definitive, subject to the constraint that there is always some small risk of human error in the compilation of so much data.