§ Mr. GardinerTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what recent estimate she has made of the cost of(a) establishing and (b) administering an end-use arms control system. [106074]
§ Mr. Mike O'BrienI have been asked to reply.
The Government do carry out end-use monitoring. This includes pre-licensing checks where information is obtained from a wide range of sources. Desk Officers have standing instructions to advise overseas posts of any approved arms licence that it is felt should be monitored post-export. Overseas posts have standing instructions to inform the UK of any suspected mis-use, or diversion, of UK arms exports. The Government are committed to carrying out post-export monitoring where this will genuinely add value to our efforts to minimise the risk of misuse and diversion.
It is not possible to establish the cost of administering the system. A large proportion of end-use monitoring does not uncover mis-use, or diversion, of an export and the monitoring activity is therefore not recorded. In addition there are a high number of officials involved in the process, but they also have other responsibilities.
§ Mr. GardinerTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what recent estimates her Department has made of the number of deals concluded each year in military and paramilitary equipment by UK nationals outside the UK; which countries were party to these deals; and in which countries these deals were completed. [106083]
§ Nigel GriffithsNone. We are consulting on the proposed secondary legislation to be made under the Export Control Act 2002. A copy of the consultation document is available from the Libraries of the House.
§ Mr. AncramTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what arms export licences have been approved for the sale of weapons to Ethiopia in the last year. [105621]
§ Nigel Griffiths[holding answer 31 March 2003]: Between 17 March 2002 and 17 March 2003, no Standard Individual Export Licence and one temporary Open Individual Export Licence had been issued, for the proposed export of items on the Military List to Ethiopia.