To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, further to his answer to the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras of 23 November 1990, Official Report, column 233, whether in assessing the suitability of firms to act as privatisation advisers he has access to the unpublished reports of the Department of Trade and Industry inspectors.

The Treasury is a competent authority for the purposes of the relevant provisions of the Companies Act 1985, and therefore has access to information obtained under that Act. As regards the suitability of firms to act as privatisation advisers, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave him on 13 November in column 112.