asked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on his recent visit to Liverpool concerning inner city area partnership committees.

On 4th November the first meeting of the Liverpool partnership was held under my chairmanship at the city's Town Hall. I and colleagues from the Departments of Industry, Employment and Education and Science, met leading members of the city and county councils, the area health authority and representatives from other departments. With the full agreement of all present we set in hand the development of an action programme for Liverpool's inner area.I took the opportunity to visit Liverpool's inner area and was able to see, among other developments, preliminary work on the construction of advance factories at the Jordan Street/Flint Street industrial area, which is being carried out using some of the £11 million funds made available by my Department under the March construction package.