asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what financial, technological and service improvements attachment of the Customs and Excise computer systems to the Government data network will bring to his Department.

The economies of scale in the development, implementation and running of a GDN are expected to save Customs money, compared with the cost of using public services or developing a network of its own. If proceeded with, the network would enable Customs data processing to be distributed between several sites. It would simplify the handling of data collected from traders and make it more available to Customs and Excise officials to use in their work.