§ Mr. Spearingasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith) of 8 July, Official Report, column 154, what is the source of the funds used to defray the difference between £621 million of increase from the sugar levy and the year's expenditure of £1,061 million in the year 1985.
§ Mr. Donald ThompsonSugar sector expenditure not covered by sugar levies is funded in the normal way through the own resources system comprising customs duties, agricultural levies and VAT. This expenditure will be partly offset by receipts from the elimination levy agreed by the Council in 1986 designed to claw back the deficit on the production levy/export refund account which had arisen in the five marketing years up to 1985–86. in the next five marketing years.
§ Mr. Spearingasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will tabulate the quantity of raw cane sugar imported by each member state of the European Economic Community, including imports from Departments Outre Mer, for the most recent available year.
§ Mr. Donald ThompsonImports of preferential ACP sugar in the period July 1985 to June 1986 were as follows (figures in thousand tonnes white sugar equivalent):
Thousand tonnes Belgium 0.4 Denmark — France 137.1 Germany 0.2 Greece — Ireland — Italy — Luxembourg — Netherlands 1.5 Portugal — Spain — United Kingdom 1,141.7 Similar information for imports of raw sugar from the French Overseas Departments is not available. In line with new arrangements following Portuguese accession, however, 185,000 tonnes and 254,000 tonnes of raw cane sugar for import, excluding preferential sugar, were allocated to metropolitan France and Portugal respectively for the 1986–87 marketing year.