HC Deb 30 March 1994 vol 240 c877W
Mr. Burns

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what expenditure it is proposed to incur in order to finance privatisation costs; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Dorrell

Expenditure will be needed to cover:

  1. (i) the initial costs of advisers, estimated at £2,000,000, in connection with the forthcoming sale of shares in the two Generating Companies;
  2. (ii) expenditure, estimated at £600,000, in connection with the Treasury's sale of privatised companies' debt this year.

Parliamentary approval of these new services will be sought in the 1994–95 main and summer supplementary estimates for Her Majesty's Treasury's sale or sales of residual Government shareholdings and Government holdings of privatised companies' debt vote (class XVII, vote 16). Pending that approval, urgent expenditure estimated at £2,600,000 will be met by repayable advances from the contingencies fund.