To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform what average hourly rate his Department and its predecessors have paid to employment agencies for agency staff in each year since 1999, broken down by employment agency. (187917)

Departmental policy is that agency staff are engaged where it is not possible to source the skills for the task from within the Department but the expectation is that the appointment would be time-limited.

Further information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.