§ Mr. RedmondTo ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will list the fact-finding visits made in the last 12 months by the chief executive of each executive agency for which he is responsible; and what were the findings resulting from each visit.
Mr. John M. TaylorThe Lord Chancellor is responsible for two agencies—the Public Record Office and the Land Registry. In the past 12 months the chief Executive of HM Land Registry made one fact-finding visit, to Australia and New Zealand. As a result of his visit the Land Registry has enhanced its information services and is adopting simplified computerised mapping techniques.
Since the launch of the PRO as an agency on 1 April 1992 the chief executive has made three fact-finding visits. On 7 July she attended the Anglo-American conference of historians, which increased the PRO's awareness of the current use of archives by historians interested in Anglo-American records. On 12 August she visited the National Audit Office, which improved the PRO's knowledge of the services the NAO can offer to agencies and of the way in which the NAO will expect agency accounts to be presented. On 2 September she attended a presentation by Her Majesty's Stationery Office intended to inform the PRO of the range and variety of publishing services which HMSO now offers to Government Departments.