To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department by what e-mail address members of the public may contact (a) him and (b) each of the Ministers in his Department; and for each e-mail address if he will state (i) the date it became active and (ii) the number of e-mails received in each month since activation [97436]

The address used for all contact by e-mail to the Home Office is public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk, and has been in use since 1999. No separate addresses for individual ministers are maintained. Details of the number of emails received each month are not available, but rough estimates have been kept on an annual basis since 1999 as follows:

1999	17,500
2000	37,000
2001	51,600
2002	86,000

These figures do not however include the large volumes of campaign emails received regularly by the Home Office. ForensicA new Correspondence Tracking System is being introduced currently which will more accurately track and monitor public and ministerial correspondence. From June 2003 the system will also be able to track and monitor public emails.