§ Mr. DalyellTo ask the Prime Minister (1) if she is satisfied with the co-ordination between the Home Office, the Department of Health and Social Security, the Treasury, the Inland Revenue, Her Majesty's Customs and Excise and the development of the Government data network;
(2) what plans Her Majesty's Government has for handling tax, national insurance, passports, criminal records, value added tax returns, and welfare benefits on a computer network; and if she will make a statement.
§ The Prime MinisterI am satisfied with the coordination between Departments, who on 11 January finalised memoranda of agreement with the consortia who will be invited to tender for the provision of the Government data network. The memoranda are based on plans for some of the data used for tax, national insurance and welfare benefits, but not currently for passports or criminal records, to be carried on the network. There are no plans to set up a central computing capability to link any of these applications; the proposed Government data network is intended to support each Department in meeting its own business needs for data transmission.