Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many staff have been employed by her Department's press office in each of the last five years; how many such staff were paid more than (a) £40,000, (b) £50,000, (c) £75,000 and (d) £100,000 in each such year; and what the total cost of her Department's press office was in those years.

The following table shows the number of staff that were employed by the press office at 31 March of each year. It also shows the number of staff that cost the department over £40,000, £50,000, £75,000 and £100,000 in each year and
what the total cost of the press office was in each of those years.

These costs to the department do not represent salaries earned. The press office operates 24 hours a day 365 days a year and the figures include weekend and on-call allowances, overtime as well as pension and national insurance
costs.

Extra allowances were paid in 2012/13 for staff that were seconded to the Government Olympic Communication hub.

Since June 2010 we have reduced the number of posts by over 3,000 across the Home Office by centralising some corporate functions. The Home Office is still set to reduce overall spending by 23 per cent in real terms by 2015.