§ Mr. BurstowTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will publish the results of his survey of Social Services Departments in respect of the change in the number of nursing home and residential care home beds between October 1999 and October 2000. [141500]
§ Mr. Hutton[holding answer 13 December 2000]: The data were collected in order to inform judgments about local preparedness and were not part of a national survey within the Department's arrangements for collecting, validating and disseminating national statistics on social care. It would therefore be inappropriate to publish the information.