§ Mr. HancockTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many civilian employees there are within the(a) defence agencies and (b) defence executive agencies; and what is the projected number of civilian employees over the next three years. [18528]
§ Mr. SpellarAll defence agencies are Next Steps agencies and no distinction is now made between defence agencies and what were one defence executive agencies. At 1 October 1997 some 61,400 permanent and 1,400 casual full-time equivalent civilian personnel worked in defence agencies. This represented 58 per cent. of permanent and 52 per cent. of casual Ministry of Defence civilian personnel at that date. While it is anticipated that there will be a small reduction of about 5 per cent. in the overall number of civilian personnel employed by the Ministry over the next three years (including Defence agencies), no separate estimates are available for defence agencies.