To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform how many redundancies from positions in the pharmaceutical industry in (a) the United Kingdom, (b) the North West and (c) Macclesfield constituency have been notified to his Department in the last 12 months. (255049)

I cannot give you details of the actual number of redundancies as there is no requirement for employers to provide that information. However, employers who propose to make 20 or more redundancies at one establishment are required to notify my noble Friend the Secretary of State of the proposal under provisions contained in the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. During the period 1 January 2008 to 31 December 2008, the Department was notified of 6,240 proposed redundancies in the pharmaceutical industry in Great Britain. The records are not maintained in the format you have requested so I regret that I am unable to break them down by region or parliamentary constituencies.