HC Deb 25 March 2003 vol 402 c144W
Mr. Bercow

To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the total cost of his Department's website was in the last 12 months; and how many hits it received in the same period. [104195]

Mr. Stephen Twigg

Core programme cost for the Department for Education and Skills central website in the last 12 months (April 2002 to March 2003) is £1,747,000.

There is now wide acceptance amongst professionals in the web industry that hits are not a measure of site performance. So the Department, in line with the Government as a whole, gives more importance to unique visitors and page impressions than hits.

Estimated site traffic for the last 12 months is as follows:

  • Hits: 98.8 million
  • Unique visitors: average 175,000 per month
  • Page views: 76.3 million.