§ Mr. Ewingasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will call for reports from the chief constables of the relevant regions concerning the costs of policing (a) the Liberal party conference at Inverness, (b) the Scottish Trades Union Congress at Inverness, (c) the Labour party conference at Perth, (d) the Conservative party conference at Perth, all held in 1985, and (e) the Scottish National party conference at Inverness in September 1984.
§ Mr. AncramI understand that it is not the practice of the forces concerned to maintain separate records of the costs of policing such events. The information requested is not therefore readily available and could be obtained from the forces concerned only at disproportionate cost, because it would be a time-consuming exercise to extract it from financial records.