§ Mr. Peter Bruinvelsasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many and what percentage of the questions set down on the Order Paper for priority written answer by him in (a) Session 1983–84 and (b) the current Session to date have initially received a holding reply.
§ Mr. JoplingI regret that this information is not available.
§ Mr. Peter Bruinvelsasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many parliamentary questions have been answered by Ministers in his Department in each of the last three complete Sessions, and the current Session to date: if he will break these figures down into questions tabled as oral questions, priority written questions and ordinary written questions, respectively; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. JoplingThe information requested is as follows:
88W
Session 1981–82 1982–83 1983–84 *1984–85 Questions tabled as Oral 316 209 403 227 Questions tabled as priority written 434 287 700 469 Questions tabled as written 552 363 713 586 Total 1,302 859 1,816 1,282 *As at 17 May 1985
Source: Departmental statistics. It should be noted that the count produced by the POLIS system in the House Library will differ from the above figures, in that on POLIS:
- (a)the oral count includes only those oral questions actually reached, plus supplementaries counted as separate questions, and
- (b)the written count includes orals not reached, writtens, priority writtens and holding replies all counted as separate questions.
The overall POLIS count will therefore exceed the Departmental count.