§ Mr. EvansTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the average response time was for responding to departmental correspondence; what percentage of letters took longer than one month for a response; and what percentage took longer than three months for a response in each of the last five years. [37445]
§ Mr. Ivan LewisThe correspondence standard in the Department for Education and Skills is to reply to 95 per cent. of all correspondence within 15 working days of receipt. Figures reflecting our performance on all departmental correspondence are shown at Tables 1a and 2a. These were published, in the annual service standards report, by Cabinet Office each year up until 2001 to show performance against the correspondence standard which is one of the six Whitehall standards set for central Government on 1 April 1997.
For the period from April 2000, when we introduced an electronic case tracking system (Correspondence Handling System), we are able to provide more detailed information on performance as shown in Tables 1b, 2b and 2c. This covers most correspondence but not emails sent direct from Ministers' offices.
Ministerial correspondence (calendar years)
494W
Table 1a Target for responses (working days) Total volume Percentage of response within target 20011 15 18,237 76 2000 15 22,318 72 1999 15 21,196 75 1998 15 19,766 70 1997 15 22,460 71 1 The figures on this table are the figures reported to Cabinet Office. They will differ from that of the Correspondence Handling System as they include correspondence not handled via this system, i.e. emails sent direct from Ministers' offices.
Table 1b—Ministerial correspondence figures taken from Correspondence Handling System on 22 February 2002 to show performance from 1 January 2001 to 31 December 2001 Final reply sent Number Percentage Less than 15 days (within target) 9,364 67.98 Between 16 and 30 days 3,672 26.66 31 days and over 738 5.36 Total 13,774 100.00 Departmental correspondence answered by officials (Financial Years)
Table 2a—Figures reported to Cabinet Office for performance relating to the periods prior to the introduction of the Correspondence Handling System Operational year Response target (working days) Total volume Percentage of responses within target April 1999—March 2000 15 96,009 90 April 1998—March 1999 15 108,000 89 April 1997—March 1998 15 116,417 88
Table 2b—Figures taken from Correspondence Handling System on 22 February 2002 to show performance from 1 April 2001 to 22 February 2002 Final reply sent Number Percentage 15 days or less (within target) 47,065 93.39 Between 16 and 30 days 2,520 5.00 31 days and over 812 1.61 Total 50,397 100.00
Table 2c—Figures taken from Correspondence Handling System on 22 February 2002 to show performance from 1 April 2000 to 31 March 2001 Final reply sent Number Percentage 15 days or less (within target) 73,954 93.36 Between 16 and 30 days 3,481 4.39 31 days and over 1,782 2.25 Total1 79,217 100.00 1 Total volume of correspondence reported to Cabinet Office and published in the annual report for this period was 85.929. This figure included residual cases not input on to the new Correspondence Handling System.