asked Her Majesty's Government:Why they have failed to provide any capital subscription to the proposed Inter-American Investment Corporation (IIC), a subsidiary of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), which has been formed to stimulate private sector investment in Latin America.

The Government's declared policy is to restrain the growth of multilateral aid as a proportion of the aid programme as a whole. The Government therefore look critically at all potential new multilateral aid commitments, and particularly so where an entirely new agency is involved. It was decided that the balance of advantage lay in our not joining the Investment Corporation. The money saved could then be used to provide bilateral aid instead, where we have greater control over its use and where the benefits to British exporters are generally greater than they are under the multilateral aid programme.

asked Her Majesty's Government:Whether they will confirm that the capital contribution proposed for United Kingdom participation in IIC is only US$1 million to be subscribed over four years; and whether they will appreciate that failure to make this investment will be a considerable discouragement to British industry, commerce and banking.

There is no capital contribution proposed for United Kingdom participation in the Inter-American Investment Corporation.The contribution to be subscribed by the non-regional members of the corporation will depend on (

asked, Her Majesty's Government:Whether they appreciate that failure to subscribe to IIC capital will preclude British industry from participating in any supply contracts that may result from the new ventures that will be created.

; The agreement establishing the corporation is silent with regard to limiting procurement to member countries, and also with regard to the application of international competitive bidding procedures. In due course, the corporation's board of executive directors will have to decide on these issues. But even if non-participants were excluded we would expect better prospects for exports from our bilateral aid.

asked Her Majesty's Government:Whether it is their expectation, hope, or intention that exercises such as those conducted by the Soviet Navy in the Narrow Seas, shown on the maps accompanying articles published in NATO Letter (September 1970) and NATO Review (December 1976), should become notifiable in advance under CBM provisions to be negotiated at Stockholm.

The Conference on Disarmament in Europe (CDE) mandate adopted at Madrid states that,"As far as the adjoining sea area and airspace is concerned, the measures will be applicable to the military activities of all the participating states taking place there whenever these activities affect security in Europe as well as constitute a part of activities taking place within the whole of Europe…which they will agree to notify" '. This means that only those naval activities, such as ship-to-shore combat activities, which form a part of a notifiable activity on land in the CDE zone are notifiable. The alliance considered prior to Madrid the balance of advantage in seeking notification of naval exercises but decided that it would be very difficult to develop a concrete, unambiguous and practicable proposal which would be consistent with Alliance security, and impose a balanced obligation on NATO and Warsaw Pact forces.

asked Her Majesty's GovernmentWhether they will indicate—

There is no agreed definition of "premature death from ischaemic heart disease". The following tables presents numbers of deaths by five-year age group in the constituent countries of the United Kingdom, assigned to ischaemic heart disease as underlying cause.

asked the Leader of the House:Whether he will make a statement on the storage of parliamentary records and library books.

Mr. Speaker and I have appointed an informal joint committee to assess the need for accommodation for Similar statistics for industrialised countries outside the United Kingdom are published in the United Nations Demographic Yearbook, a copy of which is in the Library.the House of Lords Record Office, including the Sound Archive, and the Libraries of both Houses; and to recommend whether action should be taken to provide additional accommodation.The members of the committee are as follows: