asked Her Majesty's Government:In the light of recent discrepancies in government figures, what is the increase in the number of training places available for midwives alone; how this has increased over the last three years; and what assurances they can give that this increase will be sustained. [HL765]

The information is shown in the table.

NHS Funded Pre-registration Midwifery Training Places
Year	Degree	Diploma	Total pre-reg	Other
1996–97	161	498	659	993
1997–98	224	572	796	908
1998–99	254	611	865	892
1999–2000	383	549	932	897
1998–99 data is unvalidated.
1999–2000 training places are planned.
Degree = pre-registration students undertaking a full-time equivalent degree course leading to a new midwife entering the labour market.
Diploma = pre-registration students undertaking a full-time equivalent diploma course leading to a new midwife entering the labour market.
Midwifery other = post-registration students, who are already qualified nurses undertaking a full-time shortened diploma or degree course or part-time leading to a second registration as a midwife.

This year there are over 19,000 nursing and midwifery training places available, 4,000 more than three years ago, of which over 1,800 are midwifery—4 per cent more than planned for 1998–99: 1,800 midwifery training places represents about 10 per cent of the workforce. The Government are committed to delivering 6,000 new nursing and midwifery training places by 2002. This target was based upon delivering 1,000 of those new places in the current year (1999–2000), but we are now planning to deliver 1,600. This means that cumulatively 4,800 of the places have already been secured and the number of new nurses and midwives available from summer 2002 will be 60 per cent higher than originally planned.

asked Her Majesty's Government:How many midwives are currently returning to work; and how many are intending to return to work. [HL766]

Since we launched our national recruitment campaign in February, 1999, 497 midwives have contacted the National Health Service in England about returning to work; and 2,593 nurses and midwives have returned to employment in the NHS in England since the campaign began. No figures are available on how many of these have returned to employment as midwives.This year's national recruitment campaign in England will be launched later this month. New figures to show how many midwives have returned to employment in the NHS in England will be compiled on a monthly basis after the new campaign is launched.

	Outcome
Nature of Claim	ACAS Settlement	Withdrawn or private settlement	Successful at hearing	Dismissed (merits)	Dismissed (out of scope)	Otherwise disposed of
Unfair dismissal because of disability	381	283	57	162	40	28
Other detriment	84	73	12	42	4	9
Discrimination in obtaining employment	38	30	9	33	5	2
Employer's failure to make reasonable adjustments	209	132	32	86	17	9
Total	712	518	110	323	66	48