§ Dr. KumarTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will estimate the number of ethnic minority women's voluntary organisations in the UK; and how many of these have benefited from regeneration programmes such as health action zones. [86497]
§ Beverley HughesGovernment statistics are not kept on the number of ethnic minority women's voluntary organisations in the United Kingdom. However the Council for Ethnic Minority Voluntary Organisations (CEMVO), an umbrella organisation funded by the Home Office to provide services to the black and minority ethnic (BME) voluntary and community sector had 444 BME women's organisations run by women on their database as of 9 December 2002.
Information for the number of ethnic minority women's voluntary organisations which have benefited from Health Action Zones or other regeneration programmes is not available centrally. Many programmes do however support marginalised groups and have strategies in place to increase their participation. In 2001 for instance, 560 (36 per cent.) of
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