§ Mr. Arnoldasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the present size of the Civil Service.
§ Mr. HayhoeAs I told my hon. Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, South-West (Mr. Page) in a written reply on 12 May 1983—[Vol 42, c.416]—at 1 April 1983 there were 648,700 staff in post — 518,300 non-industrial and 130,400 industrial civil servants. That represented a reduction of 3,800 since 1 January 1983. The number of civil servants has fallen by 83,600, or 11.4 per cent., since April 1979. This means that we now have the smallest Civil Service for 20 years.