asked the Minister for the Civil Service, having regard to the signing of the accession Treaty for the European Economic Community on 22nd January and the publication of the relevant documents in English with all the attendant operational regulations, if he will now provide further details of what increase in the British Civil Service he now anticipates on account of European Economic Community membership.

I would refer my hon. Friend to my reply to the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) on 19th January.—[Vol. 829, c. 197.]

Yes, but does not my hon. Friend recognise that, both in the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum to the European Communities Bill and his earlier reply to which he alluded there is talk only of an increase in the bureaucracy for administration purposes and that he conveniently omits the 5,500 extra bureaucrats to implement the value-added tax? What has he got to say about that huge increase in the cost of collecting taxes?

As I suspect my hon. Friend knows, value-added tax implementation is quite separate from the decision to join the European Economic Community.

Slippery answers, I must say.