Written question asked by George Osborne (Conservative) on Wednesday, 8 December 2004, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 21 December 2004. It was answered by Baroness Primarolo (Labour) on Tuesday, 21 December 2004 on behalf of the Treasury.

Treasury

Question: To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many (a) Customs and Excise officers and (b) operational sniffer dogs there have been in the UK in each year since 1997. - Inc table for detector dogs and ref to Cabinet Office's "Civil Service Statistics" website at http://www.civilservice.gov.uk/management_information/statis tical_information/statistics/index.asp and annual editions of "Civil Service Statistics".

Answer: Mr. George Osborne: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many (a) Customs and Excise officers and (b) operational sniffer dogs there have been in the UK in each year since 1997. [204448] Dawn Primarolo: (a) The numbers of staff employed in civil service departments and agencies since 1997, including HM Customs and Excise, are available on the Cabinet Office's "Civil Service Statistics" website at http://www.civilservice.gov.uk/manaqement information/ statistical information/statistics/index.asp and in the annual editions of "Civil Service Statistics'. (b) The following number of detector dogs were in post each year as follows. _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Number of dogs 31 March 1998 92 31 March 2002 54 31 March 2003 51 31 March 2004 54 10 December 2004 159 _________________________________________________________________________________________________. 1 Plus a further five in training school.

Secondary information