The Northern Ireland Office received the following parliamentary questions in each of the last five calendar years. It is not possible to provide separate figures for hon. Members and Members of the House of Lords.
Number 2002 1,729 2003 2,908 2004 4,137 2005 4,476 2006 13,155 1 Up to 21 June 2006.
Information regarding correspondence is below. It is listed by Department as each private office records correspondence to their respective Minister individually. As a result of this, the information is recorded in different ways by different offices. Therefore some have been unable to break down the figures to the extent requested by the hon. Gentleman.
Total Total MP Public MP3 Public 20024 5906 372 — — 26 113 2003 2,842 1,244 — — 152 408 2004 2,224 1,419 — — 127 592 2005 2,356 1,750 258 2466 121 456 20066 1,342 1,159 2 2 54 162
MP Public MP Public 20024 22 51 21 105 2003 80 127 39 45 2004 138 287 43 56 2005 153 461 47 58 20066 27 194 20 27
MP Public MP Public MP Public 20024 27 98 54 42 14 38 2003 52 195 132 227 39 128 2004 69 387 111 246 74 61 2005 51 323 123 186 27 41 20066 27 162 76 81 19 20
MP3 Public MP Public 20024 16 172 725 69 2003 145 894 90 9 2004 156 846 97 53 2005 177 922 101 77 20066 115 341 31 37 1 NIO and DHSSPS correspondence data are not held in a way that makes it possible to separate out correspondence from MPs and from others. 2 OFMDFM correspondence data are only available from 18 May 2005 to date, and it is not possible to break them down by year. 3 Includes only MPs with Northern Ireland constituencies. 4 From 1 October 2002, unless otherwise indicated. 5 From 1 January 2002. 6 Figure to June 2006. 7 From 15 October 2002. Note: Information is recorded in different ways by different Departments. The figures include some instances of double-counting, for example, where a letter is transferred between Departments or where input is required from more than one Department.