§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the offices closed by the British Council in the past year. [143291]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: The British Council has closed the following offices since December 1999: Cali and Medellin in Colombia, Minsk in Belarus and Las Palmas in Spain.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many staff will be relocated as a result of the new strategy of the British Council. [143294]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: Figures are not yet available. The British Council expects the new strategy to have some effect on the timings of the regular moves of the UK-appointed staff; locally appointed staff do not in general relocate.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent assessment he has made of the contribution to his Department's objectives made by the regional offices of the British Council in Germany. [143299]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: The Foreign and Commonwealth Office considers that the regional offices of the British Council in Germany have made a useful contribution to its objectives over the years. However, we agree with the Council's assessment that infrastructure costs, running at some 80 per cent., are unacceptably high and that, given the potential of IT services, our mutual objectives would be furthered more effectively by redirecting funding into programmes for the Laender.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (1) how many in-country staff the British Council plans to make redundant as a result of its new strategy; [143292]
(2) how many staff in each country the British Council plans to make redundant as a result of its new strategy; and what percentage this represents of total British Council staff. [143293]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: Plans for staff changes as a result of the new strategy are not yet finalised. The British Council's decisions on redundancies will be taken year by year and country by country after discussion with locally appointed staff. Current planning assumptions are that 800 posts for locally appointed staff will be cut (equivalent to about 20 per cent. of locally appointed posts) though some of the staff involved may be transferred to new posts.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what sums in grant in aid will be allocated to each British Council operation in spoke countries for each of the next five years under its new strategy. [143290]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: The figures requested, supplied by the British Council, are given in the table.
130W
Grant in aid (real terms) £000 Namibia Malawi Zambia 2001–02 117 366 374 2002–03 96 310 343 2003–04 96 246 290 2004–05 96 213 260 2005–06 73 200 250
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much the British Council plans to spend on redundancy payments for staff made redundant as a result of the new strategy. [143295]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: Over the next five years, the British Council plans to spend a total of £18.6 million, equivalent to 1 per cent. of its expected turnover over the period, on staff restructuring in the United Kingdom and overseas. This amount incorporates all payments to staff whose posts may be affected by the new strategy, including redundancy, contributions to pension arrangements, career counselling and retraining.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what studies have been undertaken by(a) his Department and (b) the British Council to evaluate the effectiveness of information technology for cultural diplomacy; and what the findings of such studies were. [143300]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: The British Council commissioned MORI to research attitudes towards the United Kingdom among young people overseas in 1999 and 2000. In 2000, the percentage of respondents saying they had been influenced by the internet was 21 per cent. as against 4 per cent. in 1999. These figures reflect the increased use made of the Council's own internet services, which now supply two million pages of information each month.
Ad hoc research undertaken by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in a range of countries also confirms the popularity of the internet as a source of information. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, like the British Council, monitors the usage and feedback on its sites on an on-going basis.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what the planned annual grant in aid allocation is under the new strategy for British Council country directorates in France, Germany and Italy for each of the next five years in real terms. [143298]
§ Mr. Hain[holding answer 18 December 2000]: The figures requested, supplied by the British Council, are given in the table:
Grant in aid (real terms) £000 France Germany Italy 2001–02 1,711 3,109 2,392 2002–03 1,515 2,646 1,871 2003–04 1,379 2,054 1,584 2004–05 1,379 2,054 1,451 2005–06 1,379 1,952 1,389