asked the Minister for the Civil Service what adjustments to existing cash limits will be necessary as a result of the 1978 Civil Service pay settlements.

Cash limits on Civil Service pay for 1978–79 included provision for a 10 per cent. increase in line with the Government's guidelines for the relevant pay round. The 1st April 1978 pay settlement for the non-industrial Civil Service provided for a 9½ per cent. across-the-board increase, together with consolidation into basic rates of the supplements of earlier pay rounds. As a result, overtime rates were increased and those few Departments with substantial overtime working have incurred costs in excess of 10 per cent.: correspondingly, Departments with little or no overtime working have incurred costs of less than 10 per cent.In one case—cash block HO 1, which contains the provision for prison officers —it had proved necessary to increase the cash limit to allow for the extra overtime costs. Compensatory reductions have been made in a number of other cash blocks containing Civil Service pay where the settlement cost less than 10 per cent.A further increase of £7·8 million in HO 1 block is also needed to finance the payment, with retrospective effect over