HC Deb 25 January 1995 vol 253 cc243-4W
Mr. Kaufman

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will set out for each of the next steps agencies in his Department, whether they have acquired their own headquarters buildings and, if so, at what purchase cost or annual rental; how many support staff they have required which were not required when their operations were within his Department; how many of them publish periodical journals and at what annual cost; how many have fleets of executive cars or single executive cars and at what annual cost; how many have specially designed logos and at what cost; how many have corporate clothing and at what cost; and what is the cost of specially designed and printed corporate stationery.

Mr. Baldry

Responsibility for the subject of the question has been delegated to Wilton Park under its chief executive, Richard Langhorne, and to the Natural Resources Institute under its chief executive, Anthony Beattie. I have asked them to arrange for a reply to be given.

Letter from Professor R. T. B. Langhorne to Mr. Gerald Kaufman, dated 24 January 1995: I have been asked to respond to your question of 18 January, 1995, concerning Next Steps Agencies. In the case of Wilton Park the answers are as follows:

  1. (i) We have been in the same leased headquarters here at Wiston house since 1951:
  2. (ii) We have engaged three support staff since we became an Agency. Two of these followed upon a 60% increase in our programme of work and were not the consequence of being turned into an Agency. One, an additional book keeper, was needed in order to fulfil the accounting needs of Agency status:
  3. (iii) We do not publish a periodical journal;
  4. (iv) We do not have any executive cars;
  5. (v) We do not have corporate clothing, though we are under pressure at present from the Trade Union Side to introduce it;
  6. (vi) We have always had Wilton Park stationery, and no extra cost was incurred by reason of being turned into an Agency.

Letter from Anthony Beattie, to Mr. Gerald Kaufman, dated 25 January 1995:

  1. 1. Mr. Baldry has asked me to reply to your question about Next Steps Agencies as this relates to the Natural Resources Institute, which is an agency of the Overseas Development Administration.
  2. 2. The answers to the questions you have posed are as follows:
    1. (a) The Institute moved to a single site at Chatham between 1988 and 1990 from nine sites previously occupied by the separate scientific units which it replaced. The majority of the staff were on three sites in central London. The 244 consolidation was planned in advance of the decision to move to agency status. The rental cost of the Chatham site (net of the cost of that part of it now occupied by the University of Greenwich) is £3,387,000 in 1994–95.
    2. (b) Prior to NRI becoming an agency it already operated as a specialised unit outside ODA HQ. Following its change to an agency NRI increased its support staff by 12 posts, mostly in finance and accounting, to meet new financial requirements and to help achieve increases in business from non-ODA customers. Subsequent staff reductions have brought the number of NRI support staff down to 132 as against 131 prior to the change of status.
    3. (c) The annual production and distribution cost of NRI's newsletter (which was in existence prior to agency status and which is sent to selected recipients in the developing world and the donor community) is £11,000.
    4. (d) NRI has no executive cars.
    5. (e) The cost of design and art work for the Institute's stationery and signage was £23,500.
    6. (f) NRI does not provide corporate clothing.
    7. (g) Annual stationery costs are of the order of £11,000 (the original design cost is given at (e) above).