§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Worsley (Mr. Lewis) of 31 July 1997,Official Report, column 542, if he will list the occasions since 30 July when Green Ministers have met, indicating what decisions were taken on each occasion. [34991]
§ Mr. MeacherSince 30 July 1997 Green Ministers have met once, on 18 December. They endorsed policy guidance on environmental appraisal which has since been formally cleared by the Cabinet Environment Committee and will be issued shortly. They also shared information and best practice on various topics including: the outcome of the Kyoto Conference on climate change; the developing integrated transport policy; systems for policy appraisal; and the greening Departments' operations.
Since October 1997, I have also met individual Green Ministers in a series of 17 bilaterals designed to address matters of particular relevance to their Departments. Only one of these Departmental bilaterals remains to be held.