Departmental Credit Cards

Richard Younger-Ross
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence on how many occasions a government procurement card was used by his departmental officials and by service personnel in each of the last five years; how much was spent via such cards in each such year; and what effect on administrative costs the use of such cards is estimated to have had since they came into operation.

Mr. Bob Ainsworth
The total expenditure and total number of transactions on the Government Procurement Cards (GPC) held by departmental officials and service personnel over the last five years is detailed as follows:

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|       |Expenditure (£)|Transactions|
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|2007-08|231,103,509    |819,903     |
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|2006-07|218,631,506    |754,329     |
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|2005-06|202,499,078    |714,471     |
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|2004-05|168,594,451    |627,006     |
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|2003-04|100,438,586    |401,980     |
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Since its implementation in the MOD, the GPC has achieved total process and administration cost savings of £101,894,044, based on the NAO savings figure of £28 per transaction. A breakdown of this is shown in the following table:

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|         |Transactions|Savings (£)|
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|2007-08  |819,903     |22,957,284 |
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|2006-07  |754,329     |21,121,212 |
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|2005-06  |714,471     |20,005,188 |
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|2004-05  |627,006     |17,556,168 |
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|2003-04  |401,980     |11,255,440 |
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|2002-03  |227,725     |6,376,300  |
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|2001-02  |61,296      |1,716,288  |
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|2000-01  |30,155      |844,340    |
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|1999-2000|2,208       |61,824     |
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|Total    |3,639,073   |101,894,044|
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