Iraq (Hansard, 7 October 2003)

§ Adam Price
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what contribution the Government has made to ensure that an accurate central list of Iraqi detainees in coalition-run prisons in Iraq, with names in Arabic, is kept. [130354]

§ Mr. Hoon
[holding answer 16 September 2003]: The names of all Iraqis held at the Theatre Internment Facility are held on a database which includes Arabic names that have been transliterated into English by an interpreter. A list of names of all UK detained Iraqis held in the Theatre Internment Facility, and for which the UK Military is therefore responsible, is passed onto the International Committee of the Red Cross every two weeks.

§ Mr. Flook
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) what the estimated monthly cost of keeping British military personnel and equipment in Iraq and the surrounding region is, following the recent deployment of extra troops; [131510]
(2) what the estimated total cost to date is of deploying British military personnel and kit to Iraq. [131520]

§ Mr. Ingram
The Ministry of Defence identifies the costs of Operations in terms of the net additional costs it has incurred. The costs which the Department would have incurred had the operation not been undertaken—expenditure on wages and salaries or on conducting training exercises, for example—are deducted from the total costs of the operation.
Calculating all the costs of military action will take some time since they will include the cost of ammunition, bombs and guided weapons consumed in excess of peacetime levels and the cost of repairing and replacing equipment destroyed and damaged. We do however estimate the cost of preparatory activities in 2002–03 at around £700 million, less than the £1 billion set aside at Spring Supplementary Estimates 2002–03. This estimate includes the procurement or modification of equipment, increased maintenance and stock consumption, civil sea and air charter and provision of infrastructure in-theatre. A figure for total costs in 2002–03 including the cost of operations up to 31 March 2003 will be published in the Department's Resource Accounts at the end of October 2003.
It is too early to estimate the costs likely to arise in 2003–04. Once these are known, additional funding will be sought in the normal way through Supplementary Estimates.
163W
Costs are not incurred on a regular monthly basis and force levels have fluctuated considerably during 2003–04. As a result, to attempt to provide monthly average costs would be misleading.