§ Mr. Gordon PrenticeTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) what assessment he made of the advantages and disadvantages of moving Cumbria from the northern standard region into the integrated north-west region;
(2) what assessment he has made of the advantages and disadvantages of transferring Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Kent, Oxfordshire, Surrey and West Sussex from the south-east standard region into the south-east integrated region;
(3) what assessment he has made of the advantages and disadvantages of transferring Merseyside from the north-west standard region and creating a free standing integrated Merseyside region;
(4) what assessment he has made of the advantages and disadvantages of transferring Greater London from the south-east standard region to the Greater London integrated region;
(5) what assessment he has made of the advantages and disadvantages of transferring Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Suffolk from the East Anglian standard region and Bedfordshire, Essex and Herfordshire from the south-east standard region into the new integrated eastern region.
§ Sir Paul BeresfordThe 10 Government offices for the regions brought together the existing regional offices of the Departments of Employment, Trade and Industry, Transport and the Environment. The proposed boundaries of the new offices harmonised the existing departmental regional boundaries and were adopted, after due consultation, when the new offices opened for business in April 1994. The boundaries are depicted in my Department's annual report, available from the House of Commons Library. There is no direct relationship between the boundaries of the Government offices for the regions and the standard regions, which are used primarily for statistical purposes.