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Written question asked by David Laws (Liberal Democrat) on Tuesday, 4 July 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 6 July 2006. It was answered by John Healey (Labour) on Tuesday, 11 July 2006 on behalf of the Treasury.

Parliamentary Questions

Question
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many written answers to parliamentary questions to the Department have taken longer than 10 days to answer in each year since 1997.
Answer

10 days has no particular significance in relation to the answering of parliamentary questions. Indeed, as any period often days will include at least one weekend and may also include other days on which the House of Commons is not sitting and questions cannot be answered, it is a meaningless yardstick against which to measure performance in answering questions. With that important caveat, the information sought by the hon. Member for each session since 1997-98 is given as follows:

Session Answers given after more than 10 days Percentage of all answers
1997-98 1,110 28.0
1998-99 653 30.8
1999-2000 584 22.1
2000-01 389 32.2
2001-02 1,237 22.5
2002-03 940 25.7
2003-04 701 22.1
2004-05 279 20.1
2005-06¹ 1,164 23.6

The proportion of written answers given by the Treasury within the timescales set by the House (that is to say, on the nominated day in the case of named day questions and within a working week of tabling for ordinary questions) in each of the last three sessions is as follows:

Percentage
Session Named day questions Ordinary questions
2003-04 74.7 79.6
2004-05 79.4 84.3
2005-06¹ 72.6 79.0
¹ Up to 30 June 2006

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
448 c1724-5W; 83395
Session
2005-06
Subjects
Treasury Written questions
Link
View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk