Hansard

Departmental Information Service

Volume 29: debated on Thursday 28 October 1982

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Mr. Whitehead

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what is the estimated total amount of income received by his Department in 1980, 1981 and 1982 to date by charging(a)the public,(b)academic institutions,(c)other Government Departments and(d)others for information provided.

Sir Keith Joseph

Part of the output of information from DES, mainly intended for the education service, is published and sold on behalf of the Department, by Her Majesty's Stationery Office. The Department does not receive any income from these sales.A charge is made for certain statistical information provided by the Department to the public and to commercial organisations. Income received over the period is:

Financial Year£
1979–80150
1980–81292
1981–821,148
to date
1982–834,668
A breakdown of these amounts into the categories requested is not available.

Mr. Whitehead

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will publish the method of charging adopted by his Department when providing information to outside bodies or individuals.

Sir Keith Joseph

In general the Department makes no charge for the information it provides to the public. The Department does recover costs for providing statistical information in two ways:

  • On request, statistical tables that are readily available are provided to the public and a handling fee is charged. The minimum charge for providing up to six such tables is £1·50 and 25p per page is levied additionally. Complete sets of readily available tabulations cost between £10 to £15.
  • Subject to the availability of resources, statistical tabulations and listings not already available may be provided. The charge for these special requests is based upon the full administrative, computing and production costs. Government Departments, Members of Parliament and the Press are not charged and those parts of the education service that provide statistics to the Department are charged only for special requests.