Question

To ask the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross representing the House of Commons Commission, how much and what proportion of the House of Commons Commission's budget was spent on activities which were contracted out in (a) 2009-10, (b) 2010-11, (c) 2011-12, (d) 2012-13 and (e) 2013-14; and how much and what proportion of the House of Commons Commission's budget he expects to be contracted out in 2014-15.

There are around 800 third party suppliers of services to the House of Commons and given system changes in recent years it would involve disproportionate cost to derive precise figures of contract expenditure by financial year. It is estimated that expenditure has broadly been equivalent to:

For 2014/15 the planned amount is around £100 million which represents 40.8% of the combined capital and resource budget.