§ Lord Lairdasked Her Majesty's Government:
Further to the Written Answer by the Lord Privy Seal on 15 January (WA 49–50) concerning Parliamentary Questions answered by the Northern Ireland Office, what steps have been taken to improve the prompt and accurate answering of questions; and whether they are satisfied with progress in this regard. [HL3179]
§ The Lord President of the Council (Lord Williams of Mostyn)The Northern Ireland Office endeavours to answer all Parliamentary Questions within the 14-day time-scale. However, because of the large numbers of Parliamentary Questions in recent months, many of52WA which have required co-ordination between several parts of the Northern Ireland Office and the formerly devolved administration, the 14-day time-scale has occasionally not been met.
The Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service has discussed this matter with all of the Northern Ireland Permanent Secretaries. The Northern Ireland departments for which the NIO is responsible for during direct rule are well aware of the importance of answering Written Questions on time.
Within the Northern Ireland Office steps taken to improve the response time to Written Questions include the Parliamentary Section employing an additional member of staff to assist in the work relating to Parliamentary Questions. They have also introduced a computerised Question tracking system to enable earlier warning of overdue questions and provide statistics on question turnaround times.
The NIO will review response times to Questions once these changes have had time to have an effect.