§ Mr. Tom ClarkeTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proportion of the Overseas Development Administration's water and sewerage sector budget has supported contracts won by the Biwater Group in each year since 1985.
§ Mr. Lennox-BoydThe Overseas Development Administration does not have a separate water and sewerage sector budget. Since 1985 Biwater Group has been awarded contracts under our bilateral aid programme spending as follows. Two contracts supported under the aid and trade provision, that is, a rural water supply scheme in Malaysia which commenced in 1986 with ATP support of £59.46 million and a hill country water project in Sri Lanka which commenced in 1988 with ATP support of £2.129 million.
Under our regular country programme—excluding ATP which is centrally managed—we maintain central records on contracts undertaken direct by ODA with United Kingdom firms as part of technical co-operation. These show that a contract, valued at £1.5 million as part of the Cairo waste water project, was placed with the Biwater Group and began in 1992.
For aid other than technical cooperation, contracts are placed with United Kingdom firms by overseas Governments or their institutions and not by ODA; our financial aid is made to the recipient country Government as a contribution to the cost of these contracts. Information on which United Kingdom firms received these contracts is not maintained centrally in ODA. Such information could be assembled only at disproportionate cost.