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Benefit Claimants

Mr. Alan Howarth: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what estimate he has made of the current numbers and proportions of recipients of (a) income support, (b) housing benefit and (c) council tax benefit with earnings set against the earnings disregard of (i) £5, (ii) £10, (iii) £15 and (iv) £25, giving figures separately for (1) couples, (2) single people and (3) lone parents. [13049]

Mr. Roger Evans: The information is set out in the tables.

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 635

Income support/housing benefit/council tax benefit couples with disregarded earnings: May 1995

Disregard	Income Support		Housing benefit		Council tax benefit
£	Number	Percentage	Number	Percentage	Number	Percentage
5	35,000	3.7	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
10	1,000	0.1	132,000	25.6	162,000	20.5
15	23,000	2.4	19,000	3.7	31,000	3.9
25	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 635

Income support/housing benefit/council tax benefit single people without dependants with disregarded earnings: May 1995

Disregard	Income Support		Housing benefit		Council tax benefit
£	Number	Percentage	Number	Percentage	Number	Percentage
5	35,000	1.0	96,000	9.9	78,000	6.5
10	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
15	5,000	0.2	3,000	0.4	3,000	0.3
25	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 635

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 635

Income support/housing benefit/council tax benefit single people with dependants with disregarded earnings: May 1995

Disregard	Income support		Housing benefit		Council tax benefit
£	Number	Per cent.	Number	Per cent.	Number	Per cent.
5	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
10	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
15	70,000	6.2	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
25	n/a	n/a	104,000	78.6	94,000	76.6

Notes:

1. Numbers are rounded to the nearest thousand.

2. It has not been possible correctly to identify the appropriate disregard in every case.

3. For housing benefit and council tax benefit, earners have been identified as those with earnings from employment and self-employment including those with part-time earnings. For income support earnings refer to income from part-time employment or self-employment.

4. N/A denotes not applicable.

5. Proportions expressed are recipients with earnings as a proportion of the relevant group type (ie. all couples/single/lone parents).

6. Figures for council tax benefit do not include second adult rebate cases.

7. Housing benefit/council tax benefit cases also in receipt of income support have been excluded as earnings have not been disregarded in terms of the housing benefit/council tax benefit assessment as they have already been taken into account in the income support assessment.

Sources:

1. Income support statistics quarterly inquiry May 1995.

2. Housing benefit management information system annual 1 per cent. sample enquiry, without income support, taken at the end of May 1995.

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 637

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 637

Income Support (St. Helens)

Mr. John Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many income support claimants in (i) WN4, (ii) WN5, (iii) L34 and (iv) L35 postcodes his Department allocated to St. Helens metropolitan district council for the purpose of calculating the authority's standard spending assessment for 1997-98. [12949]

Mr. Roger Evans: The information is not available in the format requested. Such information as is available is set out in the table:

Estimated number of income support claimants for St. Helens

Postcode	Percentage of St. Helens
WN4	2
WN5	2
L34	1
L35	5
Other Postcodes	90
Adjustment for unallocated cases	1
Estimated number of claimants	22,392

Notes:

1. Exact figures cannot be provided as a small adjustment is made to the overall caseload estimate to allow for claims which could not be allocated to local authority areas by post code.

2. The other main postcodes contributing to the St. Helens estimate were WA8--WA12.

Source:

100 per cent. count of claims registered on the income support computer system in August 1995.

Pensioner Incomes

Sir Andrew Bowden: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what was the value of the basic state pension for (a) single pensioners and (b) pensioner couples for each year between November 1979 and April 1997; and what it would have been if it had been uprated in line with whichever was the higher of average earnings or prices. [14306]

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 638

Mr. Heald: The information is in the table.

				£ per week
	Single pensioner		Pensioner couples
Uprating date	Actual rate	Higher of average earnings or prices	Actual rate	Higher of average earnings or prices
November 1979	23.30	23.30	37.30	37.30
November 1980	27.15	27.60	43.45	44.20
November 1981	29.60	30.90	47.35	49.50
November 1982	32.85	33.50	52.55	53.65
November 1983	34.05	36.40	54.50	58.30
November 1984	35.80	38.25	57.30	61.25
November 1985	38.30	41.60	61.30	66.60
July 1986	38.70	43.45	61.95	69.55
April 1987	39.50	45.90	63.25	73.45
April 1988	41.15	49.50	65.90	79.20
April 1989	43.60	53.90	69.80	86.25
April 1990	46.90	59.15	75.10	94.65
April 1991	52.00	65.60	83.25	104.95
April 1992	54.15	70.80	86.70	113.25
April 1993	56.10	74.25	89.80	118.80
April 1994	57.60	76.40	92.10	122.25
April 1995	58.85	79.45	94.10	127.15
April 1996	61.15	82.55	97.75	132.10
April 1997	62.45	86.00	99.85	137.65

1. All calculations are rounded to the nearest 5p at each uprating date.

2. The alternative uprating has been calculated using either the average earnings index (whole economy unadjusted) as published by the Office for National Statistics or the retail prices index (all items), whichever was the higher.

Benefits Agency Medical Services

Mr. Foulkes: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security, if he will list the number of doctors working at each Benefit Agency medical services centre in Scotland who are (a) full time BAMS staff, (b) current medical practitioners, (c) retired medical practitioners and (d) in other categories. [1348]

Mr. Burt [pursuant to his reply, 5 November 1996, c. 553]: I am advised that Peter Mathison, the chief executive of the Benefits Agency, will be writing again to clarify his reply.

Letter from Peter Mathison to Mr. George Foulkes, dated 5 February 1997:

I am writing to clarify the information provided to you in my letter of 5 November 1996 in response to your Parliamentary Question. You asked the Secretary of State for Social Security if he

5 Feb 1997 : Column: 639

would list the number of doctors working at each Benefit Agency Medical Services centre in Scotland who were (a) full time BAMS staff, (b) current medical practitioners, (c) retired medical practitioners and (d) in other categories.
I regret that the figures I quoted for the number of sessional fee paid doctors for Edinburgh and Aberdeen were incorrect. The figures should have been 33 and 13 respectively. The figures are provisional and subject to change.
The additional information concerning fee-paid sessional doctors is now available. Full details are contained in the attached table.
I apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Doctors working in Scotland at each centre

Centre	Full time BAMS	Sessional (fee paid)
	(employed)	Current	Retired
Glasgow/Shettlestone/Cumbernauld	22	62	9
Ayr/Kilmarnock	0	6	2
Greenock	0	4	0
Motherwell/Hamilton	0	5	1
Edinburgh	20	20	13
Aberdeen	2	6	7
Inverness	2	1	4
Dundee	4	6	4




Figures are provisional and subject to change.

Glasgow full time doctors cover a variety of areas.

All full time and fee paid doctors are current medical practitioners.

Retired doctors may have taken early retirement from general practice before the age of 60.

HEALTH

Dentistry (Children)

Mr. Chris Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the level of dental caries of five-year-old children in each region in each year since 1989. [13635]

Mr. Malone: I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) on 16 February 1996 at column 25.

Mr. Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many dental fillings per child were made in each region in each month in 1996. [13636]

Mr. Malone: The information requested is not centrally available. Before 1 September 1996 the majority of children's fillings were covered under capitation payments and the item of treatment was not individually recorded.

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