HC Deb 21 December 1999 vol 341 cc462-3W
Mr. Jim Cunningham

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what measures he is undertaking to promote social and environmental responsibility in business. [103302]

Dr. Howells

On support for environmentally responsible business, my Department is continuing to help business reduce waste in the most cost-effective way, with a five-year and £30 million extension to the joint DTI/DETR Environmental Technologies Best Practice Programme. We are helping to overcome market and technical barriers to increased use of recycled materials with an initial £1.4 million programme as the first stage of a planned bigger joint DTI/DETR initiative. We are also helping business develop the "know-how" to incorporate sustainability in products and processes from design stage through the Sustainable Technologies Initiative, worth £7.8 million over three years.

The Joint Environmental Markets Unit is helping UK business win a bigger share of the rapidly growing market for environmental goods and services—$640 billion by 2010.

My Department support socially responsible business in a variety of ways, including encouraging the spread of best practice on socially responsible business practice. Work in this area includes sponsorship of Business in the Community's Awards for Business Excellence which acknowledges examples of excellence among businesses engaged in work with community partnerships. We are also working with Business in the Community on a programme to engage business in work to spread the use of information and communication technologies in the community.

On international trade, we have publicly declared our support for initiatives such as the Ethical Trading Initiative and the FairTrade Mark, and are participating in the current review of the OECD guidelines for Multinational Enterprises.

We have also encouraged socially responsible business through a number of other activities, including improved protection for vulnerable workers and consumers and action to tackle fuel poverty. We have launched a fundamental review of company law which will consider the proper purposes of a company and to whom and on what it should report publicly, including social and environmental issues.

The report "Sharing the Nation's Prosperity" outlines the Government's policies on investment, enterprise and innovation to address regional differences in economic and social performance.