§ Mr. Llew SmithTo ask the President of the Board of Trade how many individual export licences were awarded to cover the £6,000 million of defence exports in 1993, to which preference is made at paragraph 442 of the statement of the Defence Estimates 1944, Cm 2550.
§ Mr. HeseltineThe sum of £6,000 million refers to the value of contracts placed with the United Kingdom in 1993 and not to the value of exports.
In 1993 there were issued 10,635 individual export licences in respect of all goods prefixed "ML"—munitions list—in the Export of Goods (Control) Order 1992, as amended. Not all these licences relate to exports in 1993 as licences are valid for two years. The issue of a licence does not necessarily lead to an export being made.