§ Mr. Ridleyasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is, to the latest convenient date, the number of applicants who have applied for 714 certificates, the number of applicants who have been granted one, the number who have been refused, and the number of applications still undecided.
§ Mr. Robert Sheldon, pursuant to his reply [Official Report, 24th February 1977], gave the following information:
At the latest count, on 11th February, 283,761 applications had been received, of which 208,664 had been approved, 24,601 had been refused and about 50,000 were under inquiry. The figure for approvals includes some applicants who appear also in the number of refusals because, having originally been refused, they have subsequently been granted certificates after appealing or taking the necessary steps to qualify.