Written question asked by Ian Stewart (Labour) on Wednesday, 18 November 2009, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 23 November 2009. It was answered by Lord Wills (Labour) on Thursday, 26 November 2009 on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

Departmental Taxis

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what contracts his Department has with private hire taxi companies; and what expenditure his Department has incurred against each such contract in each of the last three years.

Answer: The Ministry of Justice purchases taxi services on a regional/local level to support the small and medium enterprises that make up the market. To achieve best value for money sites are clustered and spend is aggregated where possible, while still supporting small and medium sized enterprises.Expenditure related to these contracts is not held centrally. To obtain this information would require approaching a large number of local business units across England and Wales and this could be undertaken only at disproportionate cost.

Secondary information