To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the Northern Ireland Social Fund discretionary budget will be for 1998–99. [37071]

I am pleased to announce that the Social Fund gross discretionary budget for 1998/99 will be £40.55 million. £9.76 million will be allocated to grants; £30.69 million to loans and £0.1 million will be held as a contingency reserve. The new allocations represent an increase of £0.21 million over the gross budget set at April 1997.Details of the individual District budget allocations, together with a note explaining the basis on which they have been made, have been placed in the Library today.