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Departments: Paper

Volume 458: debated on Wednesday 28 March 2007

To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what mechanisms are in place to ensure his Department's economical use of paper. (128004)

The NIO's overall policy on the consumption of any resource is to reduce, reuse and recycle. In taking this forward we give advice and guidance to staff on a range of sustainability issues via our intranet and through awareness seminars.

With regard to economical use of paper the policy is to avoid printing or copying documents unnecessarily, and if printing or copying is necessary to use a printer or copier capable of double sided printing. In addition we have greatly reduced the circulation of information on paper in favour of circulation by electronic means.

In order to measure the effectiveness of this policy we have initiated a mechanism whereby we monitor the purchase of A4 paper.