To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many staff in the Department have been on long-term sick leave in each of the last two years. [115864]
The Department for Transport was established following machinery of Government changes on 29 May 2002. In the period to 30 April 2003, 79 staff had absences lasting 30 days or more in the centre of the Department for Transport.There is no central definition of what constitutes "long-term sick leave". For the Department"s six Agencies, using absences of 21 days or more as an indicator (apart from the Driving Standards Agency, which uses absences of 30 days or more as a measure), 1,366 staff had such absences in 2001 and 1,121 staff had absences in 2002.
I refer the hon. Member to my answer of 23 January 2003, Official Report, column 518W, where it states the Department is committed to managing sick absence effectively.