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Pension Schemes

Mr. Portillo: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security (1) how many new personal pension schemes were set up in each year from 1979 to 1999; [122356]

(2) how many new occupational pension schemes were set up in each year from 1979 to 1996. [122355]

Mr. Rooker: The information is in the table.

Year	Occupational pension schemes	Personal pension schemes
1979	4,764	0
1980	4,671	0
1981	4,618	0
1982	5,705	0
1983	6,743	0
1984	8,606	0
1985	10,945	0
1986	11,009	0
1987	12,394	0
1988	22,162	161
1989	11,469	32
1990	7,779	13
1991	11,112	22
1992	8,104	12
1993	6,583	4
1994	7,501	2
1995	6,578	7
1996	8,311	16
1997	6,133	15
1998	4,939	21
1999	3,170	11
Total	173,296	316

Notes:

1. Scheme numbers are only part of the picture. More importantly, around 60 per cent. of employees currently have some form of non-state pension, either an occupational pension or a personal pension. In due course, numbers of people with non-state pensions should increase once stakeholder pensions are launched.

2. Personal pension schemes were introduced in 1988.

Source:

Pension Schemes Registry

Minimum Income Guarantee

Mr. Webb: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will estimate the expenditure on administration costs for the minimum income guarantee for 2000-01 (a) in total and (b) per recipient. [123258]

Mr. Bayley: The total estimated expenditure on administration costs for the minimum income guarantee for 2000-01 is £4 million.

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Details on administrative costings can be found in the Departmental Report. A copy has been placed in the Library.

Mr. Webb: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if, for the minimum income guarantee take-up campaign, he will estimate (a) the total administration cost to date (b) the number of pensioners that have so far responded and (c) the number of respondents that were found to be eligible. [123257]

Mr. Rooker: The information requested is not available in the format requested. Such information as is available is as follows.

The total administrative costs, to the end of April, for the project team and Teleclaims service is £1,120,369. To date the minimum income guarantee (MIG) claimline has received over 32,000 calls and from these calls over 19,000 claim packs have been issued. Current provisions allow for a claim to be submitted within one month from the initial date of contact so we are unable to specify, at this stage, how many eligible respondents have been found. The MIG campaign will be launched on 30 May. The above information does not include the costs of the proposed advertising campaign.

Pension Rights

Mr. Heppell: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security when he plans to bring into effect those parts of the Welfare Reform and Pensions Act that will protect tax-approved pension rights when a person is made bankrupt. [123520]

Mr. Rooker: The relevant sections will come into effect from 29 May 2000.

From that date, most tax-approved occupational pension rights and personal pension rights will be protected on bankruptcy.

Small Businesses (Benefit Payments)

Mr. Pollard: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what assessment he has made of the extent of increased administrative costs imposed on small businesses by the processing of state benefits through the payroll. [122358]

Dawn Primarolo: I have been asked to reply.

Having confirmed that my hon. Friend is referring to tax credits rather than to state benefits, I refer him to the regulatory impact assessment which was published and placed in the House Library in December 1999.

WALES

Opinion Research

Mr. Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how much his Department spent on opinion research in the financial year 1999-2000. [123122]

Mr. Paul Murphy: The Wales Office has commissioned no opinion research since it was established on 1 July 1999. Welsh Office expenditure prior to that date cannot ben separately identified.

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Mr. Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will list the opinion research projects undertaken on behalf of his Department in the financial year 1999-2000, itemising (a) focus group research, (b) quantitative surveys and (c) other surveys, in each case indicating when and where the results were published. [123123]

Mr. Paul Murphy: The Wales Office has commissioned no opinion research since it was established on 1 July 1999. Prior to that date, the following projects were undertaken on behalf of the Welsh Office:

(a) Focus Group Research--Nil
(b) Quantitative Surveys--Nil
(c) Other Surveys

Subject	Publication of results	Date of publication
Effectiveness of information campaign to raise public awareness of the National Assembly and its voting system	Published on National Assembly for Wales website	November 1999
Evaluation of Strategic Prevention Action Plan for Drugs and Alcohol in Wales	Not published, but details made available to respondents	n/a

TREASURY

National Insurance

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) how many people are in contracted out money purchase pension schemes that are owed backdated national insurance contribution rebates; [119941]

(2) how much money is owed in backdated national insurance contribution rebates to contracted out money purchase pension schemes; and what arrangements have been made to make these backdated payments. [119942]

Dawn Primarolo [holding answers 20 May 2000]: There are approximately 280,000 people awaiting rebates for the 1997-98 and the 1998-99 tax years. About £140 million of rebates remain to be paid. Rebates are outstanding because of problems with the NIRS2 system and errors in end of year returns. Inland Revenue's National Insurance Contributions Office is working closely with its IT suppliers to resolve outstanding difficulties with the NIRS2 system. They are also liaising with Scheme Administrators and employers to correct errors in end of year returns.

Mr. Matthew Taylor: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many people paid (a) only class II National Insurance Contributions and (b) class II in addition to other National Insurance Contributions in each of the last 10 years; what revenue the Government received from class II National Insurance Contributions in each of these years; and if he will make a statement. [122521]

Dawn Primarolo: The number of people who paid National Insurance Contributions (NICs) in tax years 1978-79 to 1995-96, by type of contribution are shown

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in table 11 of the DSS publication "Contributions and Qualifying Years for Retirement Pension 1995-96 volume 2", a copy of which is available in the Library of the House. Consistent data for 1996-97 are shown in the table.

Number of people--Great BritainThousand

Type of contribution: men and women	1996-97
Class 1 and class 2	352
Class 2 only	2,049
Combinations of class 1, 2 or 3	10

This information is based on the DSS Lifetime Labour Market Database (LLMDB) which uses a 1 per cent. sample of National Insurance records. I regret that the LLMDB does not collect information about class 4 and an analysis including class 4 would be available only at disproportionate cost.

However, in general terms, around three-quarters of those with a class 2 liability have profits greater than the lower profits limit and therefore should pay some class 4 contributions. This estimate is based on the Inland Revenue's Survey of Personal Incomes.

Class 2 contribution receipts for the years available are shown in the table:

	£ million, at 1999-2000 prices(19)
Year	Class 2 receipts for Great Britain
1990-91	660
1991-92	650
1992-93	680
1993-94	760
1994-95	760
1995-96	760
1996-97	770

(19) Using GDP deflator at market prices

Children's Tax Credit

Ms Kelly: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the (a) forecast cost of introducing the children's tax credit and (b) projected number of claimants. [122612]

Dawn Primarolo [holding answer 18 May 2000]: I refer my hon. Friend to tables A.13 and A2.1 of the "Financial Statement and Budget Report" 2000.

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