Preparation of the European Council of 23–24 March:

Key Issues Paper—Council will adopt an ECOFIN Key Issues Paper to contribute to the spring European Council;

European Investment Bank Contribution to Jobs and Growth—ECOFIN will adopt a report on the EIB contribution to promoting growth and employment;

Better Regulation—There will be a progress report from the Commission and the Council will discuss a presidency paper setting out steps to reduce the administrative cost of community programmes;

Joint Report on Social Protection and Social Inclusion— ECOFIN will discuss a joint Council/Commission report on the open method of coordination on social protection and social inclusion.

Stability and Growth Pact—ECOFIN will adopt Council opinions on the stability and convergence programmes of Portugal, Ireland, the UK, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Spain and Italy. The Council will consider a recommendation to adopt a decision on the excessive deficit procedure for Germany and conclusions on the procedure for Italy.

General Budget of the European Union:

Discharge Procedure—Council will adopt a recommendation on the discharge procedure in respect of the implementation of the 2004 EU Budget;

Priorities for the 2007 Budget—Council will adopt conclusions on priorities for the 2007 EU Budget.

Regulations have been laid before Parliament to increase National Health Service charges in England from 1 April 2006. There will be an increase in the prescription charge of 15p from £6.50 to £6.65 for each quantity of a drug or appliance dispensed.

The cost of prescription pre-payment certificates will rise to £34.65 for a four month certificate and £95.30 for an annual certificate. These offer savings for those needing more than five items in four months or 14 in one year.

Prescription charges are expected to raise around £430 million for the NHS in 2006–07. Charges for elastic stockings and tights, wigs and fabric supports supplied through the Hospital Service will be increased similarly.

The prescription charge increase this year closely reflects the level of inflation. The other increases are pro-rata with the 15p increase. These increase will help maintain the contribution charges make to NHS funding.

NHS charges in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are a matter for the Devolved Administrations.

Details of the revised NHS charges have been placed in the Library.

Section 14(1) of the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 (the 2005 Act) requires me to report to Parliament as soon as reasonably practicable after the end of every relevant three-month period on my exercise of the control order powers during that period.

The 2005 Act came into force on 11 March 2005, and was renewed by affirmative resolution in both Houses of Parliament on 15 February 2006.

During the fourth period (11 December to 10 March) I made three orders with the permission of the court under section 3(1 )(a) of the 2005 Act—one on 21 December 2005 in respect of a foreign national and two on 24 February 2006 in respect of British citizens.

I have also renewed two control orders in accordance with section 2(4) (b) of the 2005 Act.

There are 11 control orders currently in force, three of which are in respect of British nationals.

On 8 November 2005 I informed the House of our decision to reverse the policy requiring the Immigration Service to seek the consent of individuals before imposing an electronic monitoring regime as part of contact management plans. I also said I would provide a further update to the House on developments in the use of electronic monitoring in an immigration context.

Electronic monitoring takes three forms: telephone reporting using voice recognition technology, tagging and satellite tracking. A pilot during October 2004 to February 2005 focused on the practicalities of applying electronic monitoring in an immigration context. Since then, the Immigration Service has been working on how best to use electronic monitoring as part of our developing contact management strategy. Contact management, including electronic monitoring is a key aspect of the "New Asylum Model" as described in the five-year plan.

We have focused the use of telephone reporting on managing our contact with lower risk cases in conjunction with physical reporting at reporting centres. We are thereby able to:

manage better the throughput at our reporting centres in line with the intelligent reporting strategy;

avoid unnecessary travel by those required to report;

maintain contact with those who live beyond a reporting centre catchment area;

maintain contact with those who find it difficult to travel to a reporting centre, for example, those who are ill or pregnant women immediately before and after the birth of their child; and

monitor compliance with the residence restrictions we place on people.

The use of tagging is being focused on higher risk cases. Among the key applications for tagging are cases where we have not detained, but where we wish to maintain a high level of contact and control because the circumstances of the case suggest that the individual may not comply, for example to avoid removal. The categories which meet those criteria include:

asylum seekers who have previously claimed in a third country;

cases where appeal rights are exhausted or where the right of appeal is non-suspensive;

those who make late and opportunistic claims to asylum; and

those who are not documented or who express a reluctance to comply with the documentation process.

We will shortly be extending the use of tagging to those who cannot continue to be detained at Oakington and Colnbrook Reception Centres and Harmondsworth Removals Centre but who are shortly to be removed. We also intend to begin tagging people at reporting centres at the point of service of their dismissed appeal determination pending removal.

We have made less use of satellite tracking. This is partly because of the geographical limits on the availability of the technology to Greater Manchester, Hampshire and the West Midlands as part of a wider pilot sponsored by the National Offender Management Service which was only running in these areas. We will do further work to establish clearly whether this more intrusive method of contact management will deliver business benefits and provide value for money.

During the original pilot, in line with the requirement for consent, monitoring periods were generally set in a way which did not impact on an individual's movements, for example, monitoring periods of two hours early in the day, twice a week. By imposing more frequent monitoring periods and at different times of the day, we intend to demonstrate to those who are not detained that we intend to exercise a high level of control pending their removal.

In December 2005 the Immigration Service carried out an exercise at the Asylum Screening Units (ASUs) in Liverpool and Croydon to tag adult asylum applicants at the point of claim. By making clear the intention to tag the applicant our aim was to discourage unfounded applications for asylum. Eleven applicants—all of whom were liable to detention—were tagged during the week-long exercise, and the ASU have continued to refer claimants for tagging who are not detained. A total of 60 claimants at the ASUs had been tagged by the end of February 2006. For the purpose of the exercise we sought to tag only those claimants with settled addresses in view of the cost and logistical difficulties of inducting and re-inducting those moving between different properties run by emergency accommodation providers. However, as our aim is to send a clear message to unfounded claimants, we are working towards tagging all adult claimants at our ASUs who are not detained, including those who seek asylum support.

Tagging is not suitable in all cases where the substantive claim to asylum has yet to be considered. Cases where we would not seek to tag at the point of claim include certificated medical foundations cases and those who have been the victims of trafficking. Those cases may still be suitable for electronic monitoring, however, through telephone reporting to allow us to monitor compliance with residence requirements.

By February 2006, some 353 people had been inducted onto telephone reporting, which requires them to telephone the monitoring centre once a week, in lieu of reporting to an Immigration Reporting Centre. The number currently reporting, (net of those who are no longer subject to telephone reporting) is 260. We have inducted 192 people onto a tagging regime, of whom 154 are currently tagged. Of those no longer subject to electronic monitoring, 21 have been removed. Two left voluntarily. Five people were made subject to tracking orders, and two are currently being tracked.

The evaluation of the original trial on EM found that the overall compliance rate in terms of tagging and tracking was 68 per cent. The compliance rate for both tagging and telephone reporting is currently around 90 per cent.

Electronic monitoring provides the Immigration Service with a real alternative to detention while allowing them to manage the risk of non-compliance with reporting and residence restrictions according to the specific circumstances of a case. The Immigration Service will plan to apply electronic monitoring to higher numbers of cases next year as they continue to develop the initiative. I will update the House from time to time when those developments are significant.

I will publish shortly the Government's final response to ECGD's consultation on changes made to their anti-bribery and corruption procedures in December 2004.

I am today publishing a consultation paper that sets out our proposals for using a power included in the Equality Act 2006 to make regulations that prohibit sexual orientation discrimination in the provision of goods, facilities and services, in education and in the exercise of public functions. We propose to lay these regulations in the House in October. They will be subject to the affirmative procedure.

I have placed copies of the consultation paper in the House Library. This seeks views on specific points about the range of activities that should be covered by the regulations, and on whether any exceptions should be provided from them to ensure that the protection from sexual orientation discrimination that is introduced is effective and appropriately targeted. The consultation period will last for 12 weeks, closing on 5 June.

I am pleased to inform the House that I am today inviting applications for petroleum licences for unlicensed seaward blocks which will form the 24th round of offshore petroleum licensing. These blocks are located in the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) areas 1–6 (a map of the SEA areas can be found on the website indicated below).

The DTI's draft plan to offer licences for offshore oil and gas exploration and production through a 24th licensing round was the subject of a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) initiated in 2004. The SEA is documented on a dedicated website (www.offshore-sea.org.uk) and includes commissioned reports on various components of the natural environment, cultural features and socio-economic considerations. In addition, as part of the SEA new information was collected for example on selected seabed features through seafloor mapping, sampling and photography, and on the offshore behaviour of seals by means of satellite tagging. The draft plan for the 24th licensing round included offering blocks within the Irish sea, and also in those areas that had been subject to earlier DTI SEAs (SEAs 1,2,3,4 and 5) which covered the UK North sea exclusive economic zone and the UK EEZ to the north and west of Orkney and Shetland.

The potential implications of the exploration and production activities which could follow if the draft plan was adopted were considered at an expert assessment workshop and a stakeholder workshop. The results of these workshops were assessed further and documented in an Environmental report which then formed the basis for consultation with the consultation bodies and the public. The initiation of a three-month consultation period on the DTI's draft plan and Environmental report was advertised in a number of local and national newspapers and by email notification to a wide range of individuals and organisations.

All responses received from statutory and other consultees on the draft plan and the Environmental report have been considered by the DTI and a post consultation report for SEA 6 prepared and placed on the SEA website. This summarises consultee comments and DTI responses to them. The full texts of consultee comments have also been placed on the SEA website.

In deciding to proceed with a 24th offshore licensing round the DTI has considered the conclusions and recommendations of the SEA 6 Environmental report together with feedback received from consultees. As a result of the SEA process, a number of blocks are being withheld from licensing for the present on environmental grounds. These blocks are:

34/6, 34/7, 34/8, 34/12, 34/13, 34/17, 34/18, 40/15, 41/29, 41/30, 47/11, 47/27, 47/28, 47/29, 47/30, 48/26, 51/3, 51/4, 51/5, 52/1, 52/28.

Licensing of these blocks may be revisited in the future, for example as more information on the features of interest becomes available. A case in point is blocks 15/20c and 15/25d which have been withheld from licensing since 2002 (SEA 2) but following consideration of a commissioned study from the British geological survey are now included in the 24th round (with conditions attached). In addition, a number of blocks may be licensed but with conditions attached restricting or prohibiting marine activities. It should be noted that the Offshore Petroleum Production and Pipe-lines (Assessment of Environmental Effects) Regulations 1999 and the Offshore Petroleum Activities (Conservation of Habitats) Regulations, 2001 variously require that all major activities undertaken in connection with UK offshore hydrocarbon exploration and production include environmental assessment as part of consenting.

In addition, 50 blocks will not be offered for licensing in these SEA areas at the request of the Ministry of Defence

The DTI has established an offshore oil and gas environmental monitoring committee which is charged with coordinating the monitoring of significant environmental effects of the industry, including those that could arise from the implementation of the plan to hold a 24th round of offshore licensing.

In addition to the website above, a copy of the SEA Environmental report can be reviewed at:

Department of Trade and Industry

1 Victoria Street

London

SW1H 0ET

Arrangements to view the report can be made by telephoning 0207 215 5032.