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Working Families Tax Credit
Mr. Cox: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many people living in the London borough of Wandsworth are in receipt of the working families tax credit. [25900]
Mr. Andrew Smith: The number of recipients of the working families tax credit and the disabled person's tax credit in each region, local authority and parliamentary constituency are shown in "Working Families' and Disabled Person's Tax Credit Statistics. Geographical analyses." This can be found on the Inland Revenue website, www.inlandrevenue.gov.uk, under "Statistics", and in the Library.
Fraud
Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to his answer to the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) of 12 November 2001, Official Report, column 585W, what assessments have been undertaken which show that the level of fraud on inactive national insurance accounts is no higher than for live accounts. [24247]
10 Jan 2002 : Column: 966W
Mr. Andrew Smith: In 1999, as part of the NI Integrity Programme, a review of inactive accounts (where no national insurance contributions or credits have been recorded for three or more consecutive tax years) on NIRS2 was carried out. Most of these accounts relate to women who do not have paid employment. Others relate to people who have gone to live abroad.
Part of the review resulted in an analysis of 100 accounts of contributors found guilty of fraud and 22 were inactive (22 per cent.) and 78 were live accounts. The number of fraudsters using inactive accounts appears to be in proportion to the number of inactive accounts held on NIRS2 (14 million of the 66 million accounts held on NIRS2 are inactive, which equals 21 per cent.).
We have initiated further work under the banner of the 'National Insurance Number (NINO) Work Programme' sponsored by the NINO board (a joint Department for Work and Pensions and Inland Revenue project). This will look at all areas of vulnerable accounts held on the NIRS2 and Departmental Central Index systems.
Taxation
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of gross earnings was accounted for by (a) income tax, (b) national insurance contributions, (c) VAT, (d) other indirect taxes and (e) local taxes for (i) a single person, (ii) a married couple who are both working and (iii) a married couple with two children on (A) 50 per cent., (B) 75 per cent., (C) 100 per cent., (D) 150 per cent., (E) 200 per cent., (F) 500 per cent. and (G) 1,000 per cent. of average earnings in each year since 1997. [25296]
Mr. Andrew Smith: The available information, which shows income tax (including child benefit and working families tax credit from its first full year of implementation) and national insurance contributions for multiples of median earnings up to 200 per cent. was published in answer to a question from the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) on 30 March 2001, Official Report, columns 843–44W. The same information for 500 per cent. and 1,000 per cent. of median earnings is given in the table. The estimates of median earnings used here are the same as those in the earlier answer, £19,600 per annum in 2001–02).
Estimating the impact of indirect taxes on these very specific family types is meaningless because spending patterns vary considerably between households of the same type and income. The level of council tax payments also varies depending on where families live.
1. Income tax payments are calculated on the basis that the households receive no tax reliefs other than the standard allowances and only have income from employment. All earners are assumed to pay Class 1 national insurance contributions at the contracted-in rate.
2. Earnings are taken to be the median gross weekly earnings of all full-time employees on adult rates with pay unaffected by absence. (Median earnings are more representative of the population as whole than mean male full-time earnings).
3. In line with the convention in the Tax Benefit Reference Manual, Child Benefit is treated as negative income tax.
4. For the two earner family it is assumed that earnings are split 60 per cent.:40 per cent.
10 Jan 2002 : Column: 969W
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