To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much (a) his Department and (b) its agencies spent on each of the external public relations and marketing companies included in the Central Office of Information’s Public Relations Framework in each of the last 36 months. (221943)

As with all goods and services procured by the MOD, when buying in external public relations and marketing services, robust principles are applied which include securing best value for money; ensuring probity and accountability; enabling competition wherever possible; and ensuring compliance with the relevant provisions of UK and EU law.

Specifically in relation to external public relations and marketing services, the MOD has made payments to the following company in the Public Relations Framework as follows:

These figures exclude VAT, and are rounded to the nearest £10,000. They reflect transactions made by the MOD’s central Financial Management Shared Service Centre, which handles about 95 per cent. of all MOD payments. Payments not included are those which may have been made (a) on behalf of other Government Departments, (b) by the MOD’s trading funds (which lie outside the MOD’s accounting boundary), (c) locally by the Department, or (d) in relation to collaborative projects where the payments are made through international procurement agencies or overseas Governments.