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Budget Summary

Chris Grayling: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much his Department spent on designing, producing and distributing the Budget 2002 summary leaflet; and to whom it was distributed. [67811]

Dawn Primarolo: The Budget 2002 summary leaflet was designed, written and edited by Treasury officials. The costs of production and distribution of the leaflet were met from within Departmental Expenditure Limits and amounted to approximately £208,000.

The leaflet is available free of charge from the Treasury and is published on the Treasury website. Copies of the leaflet were also distributed nationwide through libraries, educational establishments, citizens advice bureaus, Jobcentres, NHS hospitals, GPs' surgeries, and other organisations.

Expenditure

Barbara Follett: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the Inland Revenue department's Vote on Account provision for 2002–03 will be sufficient to finance spending until Royal Assent to the Appropriation Act later this summer. [68862]

Dawn Primarolo: Royal Assent to the Appropriation Act was given on 8 July. Prior to that point, the overall Vote on Account provision for the Inland Revenue Estimate was sufficient in terms of both resources and cash to finance spending until Royal Assent. However, the Valuation Office Agency's Request for Resources (RfR) 4 had consumed £500,000 more resources than anticipated in the Vote on Account because of a change in the profile of the liabilities.

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The increase in resources was offset by lower resource consumption on RfR1 enabling resource consumption on the Estimate as a whole to remain within the overall Vote on Account resource provision. The net cash requirement remained unchanged.

Vote on account provision£

	Before	After	Change
RfR1	1,006,990,000	1,006,490,000	-500,000
RfR2	—	—	—
RfR3	93,600,000	93,600,000	—
RfR4	14,045,000	14,545,000	500,000
Total	1,114,635,000	1,114,635,000	0

Child Poverty

Mr. Ben Chapman: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what progress has been made on recent steps taken to alleviate child poverty. [68801]

Dawn Primarolo: The Government's annual anti-poverty report, "Opportunity for All" shows progress on a range of poverty and social exclusion indicators linked to child poverty—low-income, worklessness, health, education and housing—each of which is reflected in a short-term Public Service Agreement (PSA).

The Government will continue to make progress towards their goal of eradicating child poverty with the introduction in April 2003 of two new tax credits— the child tax credit and the working tax credit. The Government are also making substantial investment in services for children.

Poverty Policy

Mr. Wiggin: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what changes are planned in relation to the Government's poverty policy. [69010]

Dawn Primarolo: This Government are committed to halving child poverty by 2010 and abolishing it within a generation. As a result of personal tax and benefit changes announced since 1997, by April 2003 the poorest families with children will be on average £2,400 better off in real terms.

To make further progress towards its eradication goal, Government are introducing two new tax credits—the child tax credit and the working tax credit—in April 2003. The Government are also making substantial investment in services for children.

The Government are also committed to tackling pensioner poverty. It has introduced the minimum income guarantee and is committed to raising it in line with earnings throughout this Parliament. From 2003, the pension credit will enable those with a modest amount of second pension or savings to gain on average just over £400 a year.

Tax Credits

Matthew Taylor: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will place in the Library the reply from HM Treasury to the Statistics Commission, dated 2 July,

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to the Head of Profession for Statistics at HM Treasury concerning tax credits; and if he will make a statement. [69244]

Ruth Kelly: Yes. I have arranged for the Treasury's reply to the Statistics Commission to be placed in the Library.

Horse Breeding

Miss McIntosh: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will provide tax reliefs for (a) the horse breeding industry and (b) stallion owners, similar to those which exist in Ireland. [69368]

Dawn Primarolo: The Government keep all taxes under review as part of the normal Budget process.

In the UK, racehorse owners, including breeders, already benefit from the VAT Registration Scheme for Racehorse Owners which allows owners, breeders, dealers and trainers who generate business income through horseracing, to register for VAT and thus recover the full VAT costs on the purchase and training of their horses. In addition to this stud farming is treated as farming for tax purposes and is therefore subject to special reliefs such as the Agricultural Buildings Allowance and Agricultural Property Relief.

Pensions (Public Servants)

Mr. Beggs: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list the (a) full-time and (b) part-time public servants for whom no occupational retirement pension provision exists; whether such provision will be made by Her Majesty's Government; and if he will make retrospective pension arrangements for such public servants. [69255]

Dawn Primarolo: Most public servants now are covered by occupational pension schemes and any that are not have access to stakeholder pensions. Individuals may opt out of their employer's pension arrangements.

Precise eligibility for membership is a matter for the individual pension schemes. Since 1995 public service occupational schemes have been required to provide access to part-timers. Where eligibility has been extended retrospective membership has not usually been allowed unless it is legally required.

A recent ECJ ruling on the Preston case, concerning a part-timer working for the NHS who claimed retrospective admission, means that many thousands of part-timers will be admitted into public service scheme prior to 1995, once the outstanding legal issues have been resolved in the Employment Tribunals.

Health Funding

Stephen Hesford: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what recent assessment he has made of the cost-effectiveness of health care systems in other countries funded by charges and private medical insurance. [69233]

Mr. Boateng: Further to the answer given by my predecessor (Mr. Andrew Smith) on 15 April 2002, Official Report, column 772W, in April Derek Wanless

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published a study commissioned by his review on international health care systems, considering health systems in individual countries around the world.

A copy of this study, prepared by the European Observatory on Health Care Systems, is available in the Library and can be accessed from the Treasury's website at: http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/mediastore/otherfiles/ observatory_report.pdf.

False Identity

Mr. Lilley: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what was the (a) estimated annual number of people and (b) amount of tax unpaid by people using false identities, broken down by (i) VAT, (ii) other Customs and Excise duties and (iii) Inland Revenue taxes; and how much he estimates would have been prevented if everyone had been required to possess an ID card. [69311]

Dawn Primarolo: HM Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue do not keep records of the number of people specifically using false identifies involving VAT, Customs or Excise frauds or in connection with tax evasion.

Savings Tax Directive

Mr. Andrew Turner: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what progress has been made in negotiations to encourage non-EU countries to adopt measures equivalent to the Savings Tax Directive. [69371]

Dawn Primarolo: The Presidency and Commission of the European Union are now engaged in negotiations with all of the third countries named in the Conclusions of the European Council when meeting in Santa Maria da Feira on 20 June 2001 (Switzerland, United States of America, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Andorra and San Marino). The ECOFIN Council reported to the Seville European Council on 21–22 June on progress in the negotiations, and this report can be found on the Council's website, www.europa.org.

Companies (Ilford, North)

Linda Perham: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many VAT-registered companies in the Ilford, North constituency have an annual turnover of £100,000 or less. [69616]

John Healey: Customs data on VAT registered traders is maintained on a national and regional basis. Each of the seven Customs regions incorporates a number of parliamentary constituencies. It would involve disproportionate cost to produce this turnover data in the format requested.

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