asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether the Isle of Wight is included in the list of those councils which qualify for possible assistance from the fund established following the floods and storms of the winter.

Special financial assistance is available to any local authority incurring exceptional expenditure beyond the product of a 1p rate as a result of the floods and gales of November 1977 and January 1978 and of the blizzards of February 1978. I cannot say whether the Isle of Wight would be one of these authorities until they let me have details of their exceptional expenditure.