§ Mr. DonohoeTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much his Department and its executive agencies have spent drafting, publishing and circulating each of their customer charters and customer standard documents; and how many copies of each document have been issued. [19389]
§ Mr. ArbuthnotMy Department keeps no central record of this information. Where such documents are published by agencies, this is a matter for the chief executives and I have asked them to write to the hon. Member.
Letter from J. C. R. Hunt to Mr. Brian Donohoe, dated 13 March 1997:
332WI am replying to your Question to the Secretary of State for Defence about customer charters and Customer Standard documents and the cost and number of each document issued as this matter falls within my area of responsibility as Chief Executive of the Metrological Office.In the current financial year we will spend some £200 on printing our own Charter Standard for the Public, which is the only one of our publications falling within the ambit of your question. About 3,500 copies will have been distributed in various ways.The administrative/drafting costs of updating our Charter cannot be identified in isolation but are unlikely to exceed £1,000.I hope this information answers your question.Letter from M. A. Rowe to Mr. Brian Donohoe, dated 13 March 1997
I am replying to your Question to the Secretary of State for Defence regarding production of a customer charter. This matter falls within my area of responsibility as Chief Executive of the Pay and Personnel Agency (PPA).The PPA customer charter has not yet been printed, but our predecessor organisation—the Pay Services Directorate of the Defence Accounts Agency—issued 20,000 copies of its charter at an overall cost of £5,143. We estimate the equivalent cost of the PPA customer charter will be £3,500. It will be issued to every member of the MOD paid by the PPA—some 120,000 staff—but it will be a simpler version of its predecessor, hence the lower costs.