§ Mr. RentonTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what assistance the Government propose to make available to the British Council to help with its restructuring costs and to avoid overseas port closures. [30511]
§ Mr. RifkindI have today written to the chairman of the British Council informing him that my Department is prepared to meet 80 per cent. of the actual costs of redundancies among its grant in aid funded UK appointed staff this financial year. I propose to finance this from the Overseas Development Administration's contingency reserve. Since this reserve is higher than originally planned, this can be accommodated without affecting our ability to respond to foreseeable emergencies or reducing planned aid programmes. That part of the funding which serves aid objectives will be provided directly through the ODA vote. For the balance, I shall be seeking parliamentary authority later this year to make the appropriate transfer between the ODA and British Council votes.
In my letter to the chairman I have also assured him that an additional £5 million in 1997–98 and £9 million in 1998–99 will be made available to the Council from within my departmental programme in order to avoid closures of British Council offices overseas to help sustain their programmes in priority countries and to contribute towards their continuing redundancy costs.
The British Council will of course be continuing with their existing programme of efficiency savings.
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