Dwp Record Storage Facilities

EDM number 1010 in 2002-03, proposed by Frank Cook on 03/04/2003.

That this House registers the deepest dismay at Government proposals to privatise nationally the File Storage Facilities of the Department of Work and Pensions; notes that these facilities are located at more than 40 points throughout the country, that more than 900 staff would be affected directly by the implementation of such proposals and that these staff are almost exclusively of grades attracting salaries of ú12,000 or less; notes, too, the strenuous efforts made by the Public and Commercial Services Union to make representations to the Ministry with regard to the potential threat to the security and safekeeping of the most sensitive records of millions of recipients of social benefits; is concerned that direct control of costs incurred should be offloaded to agencies with the prime concern of exacting profit from the function; and therefore urges Her Majesty's Government most urgently to take full and careful account of the case expressed by PCS with a view to ensuring that the task of preserving all records and the jobs involved in their safekeeping and control remain within the proper remit of the Civil Service where it properly belongs.

This motion has been signed by a total of 24 MPs.