§ The Marquess of Downshireasked Her Majesty's Government:
What targets have been set for the Pesticides Safety Directorate for 1997–98.
Lord LucasMy right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has set the following targets for the Pesticide Safety Directorate in 1997–98
Financial Performance
1. To recover from industry the full economic cost (calculated according to accruals accounting) of its services
2. To recover from government the full economic cost (calculated according to accruals accounting) of its services.
3. To operate within the net cash allocation as agreed by the MAFF Management Board
4. To deliver the throughput of applications and processing times set out in the table.
102WAQuality of Service
5. To deliver high quality policy advice to Ministers
6. To deliver high quality scientific work
7. To achieve IIP accreditation by October 1997
8. To carry out a Customer Satisfaction Survey, covering both MAFF customers and the agrochemical industry, and to achieve a satisfactory result.
Table 1 Stream Applications completed Maximum processing time in working weeks Technical Secretariat 1, 2 Normal 300 43 Administrative Fast 400 4 Fast 325 19 Experimental Permit Authorisation 10 34 Off Label 80 12 Extrapolated Experimental Authorisation 15 16 Departmental 15 52 Other 132 — New Substances 1, 2, 3 Sift (EC and UK) 17 23 Active Substance 14 53 UK Reviews2 Full 3 — Other 8 — EC Reviews3 Non-Rapporteur (Monograph Co-ordination) 20 — Total 1,339 — Notes: 1 90 per cent, of applications received are covered by the processing targets except the EC and UK sifts for New Substances, where the figure is 100 per cent. 2 Completed applications (these have no outstanding actions e.g. an approval issued or the application has been refused). These exclude withdrawals before evaluation has started. 3 For EC applications (reviews or new active substances), completion is when the monograph is received by the Commission.