§ Mr. Clifton-BrownTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what changes she plans to make to cash limits and running cost limits on votes within her responsibility for 1996–97. [2626]
§ Mr. Robin SquireSubject to parliamentary approval of the necessary supplementary estimate, the cash limit for class IX, vote 1, Department for Education and Employment: programmes and central services, will be amended as follows:
- Class: IX
- Vote: 1
- Existing cash limit: £8,744,945,000
- Change: £197,000
- New cash limit: £8,745,142,000.
The cash limit for class IX, vote 1 will be increased by £197,000 from £8,744,945,000 to £8,745,142,000. The cash limit increase is the net effect of the following: take-up of entitlements announced by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury on 12 July 1996, Official Report, columns 326–31, under the end-year flexibility schemes for capital expenditure (£2,189,000) and EU structural funds (£177,283,000—offset by receipts from the EU and increased appropriations in aid). We have also funded a £300,000 increase in specialist schools expenditure from our non-voted provision. Transfers to other Departments include £263,000 to the Department of Health for the drugs challenge fund; £2,000,000 to the Home Office for school security measures; £67,000 to the Department of the Environment as a contribution towards the Manchester bomb appeal; and £90,000 to the Office for National Statistics to provide funding for staff moved under machinery of Government changes. These transfers to other Departments have been partially offset by a transfer of £128,000 from the Home Office to fund the costs of probation service training.
The running costs provision for class IX, vote 1 will be increased by £558,000 from £366,705,000 to £367,263,000. This is the net effect of the transfer of £648,000 from the Department of Trade and Industry towards work done on an agency basis by the Department for Education and Employment, offset by the transfer to the Office for National Statistics of £90,000.
The increase will be offset by savings or charged to the reserve and will not, therefore, add to the planned total of public expenditure.