Publicity and Publications (Hansard, 17 March 1995)

Mr. John M. Taylor

The cost of publicity, publications and pamphlets, including court forms, produced centrally by the Lord Chancellor's Department since 1992 is as follows:

Year	£
1992–93	1,529,211
1993–94	1,342,743

Letter from Sarah Tyacke to Mr. Malcolm Bruce, dated 17 March 1995: I have been asked by the Lord Chancellor's Parliamentary Secretary to reply to your question relating to expenditure on publicity and on publications and pamphlets for each year since 1979, including the budgeted cost for 1995–96. The Public Record Office has a publications programme for the public records. The figures are:

Year	£
1990–91	13,282
1991–92	15,050
1992–93	39,954
1993–94	65,546
1994–95	¹78,900
1995–96	¹61,800
¹ Budget.

Information for earlier years is not held centrally and could only be obtained at disproportionate costs.

The Public Record Office has not held a publicity campaign or issued a publication whose cost has exceeded £50,000.

Letter from S. Hutcheson to Mr. Malcolm Bruce, dated 17 March 1995: The Parliamentary Secretary of the Lord Chancellor's Department has asked me to reply to you as a part of the Lord Chancellor's Department's response to your Parliamentary question, listed on 14 March 1995, regarding expenditure on publicity and publications and pamphlets. The Public Trust Office has not undertaken any publicity campaigns and none is planned for 1995–96. 726W The information required on all publications and pamphlets for each year since 1979 is not readily available and it would not be cost effective to produce the information required in the short period available. The budgeted figure for 1995–96 is not available as it is subsumed within other planned expenditure. As the Public Trust Office has not been privatised there has been no related expenditure.

Letter from John Manthorpe to Mr. Malcolm Bruce, dated 17 March 1995: I have been asked by the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department, to reply to your recent question concerning total expenditure by HM Land Registry on all forms of publicity and all publications and pamphlets produced for each year since 1979. I can provide the following information.

(a)Publicity The table below identifies publicity expenditure (expressed in 1994 prices) since 1989–90. These expenditures cover all public relations activities, communications to Land Registry staff and customer service literature. Prior to that date, no specific budget was held for these purposes. There has been no privatisation related expenditure incurred by the Land Registry.

Year	£
1989–90	3,368
1990–91	17,078
1991–92	24,400
1992–93	21,643
1993–94	10,765
1994–95	60,069
1995–96 (Budget)	46,489

(b) Publications and Pamphlets

The Land Registry produces a wide range of explanatory literature containing advice for practitioners and the general public on various aspects of land registrations practice and procedure and on the services that it provides. The cost of providing these publications is subsumed within the Registry's total stationery budget and individual elements cannot be identified. Stationery costs bear a direct relationship to the operational work of the Registry to which the majority of the budget is devoted.

In respect of publications issued by HMSO, for instance the Registry's Annual Report and Accounts, costs are borne by HMSO who aim to recover these from sales revenue.

As to the second part of your question, during the period from 1 April 1993 to 1 March 1995 the Land Registry did not undertake any publicity campaign or produce any publication involving the expenditure of more than £50,000.

There is no cost to the Exchequer for the Agency's publicity or publications as the Land Registry meets all of its expenditures from fees paid by those who use its services.

I do hope that this answers the points raised with the Parliamentary Secretary but please contact me if I can be of any further assistance.