Departmental Flags

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how much money has been spent on maintaining flags owned by his Department in the last year. (278120)

The expenditure on flag maintenance by the Ministry in the financial year 2008-09 is stated in the following table:

	£
Ministry of Justice HQ	1,127
HM Courts Service	¹35,743
Tribunals Service	0
Office of the Public Guardian	0
Total	36,870
¹ Of the £35,743 for HM Courts Service, £24,052 was incurred on the provision and removal of flags, as well as flag maintenance. It is not possible to separate the two elements without a detail review of invoices that would incur disproportionate cost.

Flag maintenance expenditure includes the testing, inspection and surveying of the flags to ensure that they are in full operating condition.

Data on the operation and maintenance of flags by the National Offender Management Service are held locally by prisons and probation boards/trusts and can be collated only at disproportionate cost.

Volume 495: debated on Friday 3 July 2009