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Deregulation

Brian Cotter: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list the deregulation measures which have been implemented by his Department since February 2002; and if he will make a statement. [112834]

Dawn Primarolo [holding answer 12 May 2003]: The Government has taken forward a wide range of measures over the past year to reduce and simplify the regulatory burden on public, private and voluntary sectors. Many of these measures are described in detail in Chapter 3 of the

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Economic and Fiscal Strategy Report (web link http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/budget/bud_bud03/budget_ report/bud_bud03_repchap3.cfm and the accompanying press notice entitled Supporting Business and Entrepreneurship, both published on 9 April.

In Budget 2003, the Chancellor announced that the Government had identified over 500 proposed deregulatory measures across government since February 2002, including, and building on, over 250 measures that were announced as part of the Government's Regulatory Reform Action Plan.

Some of the most notable deregulatory measures that have been implemented by the Chancellor's departments' since February 2002 include:

Optional flat rate VAT scheme for small business, enabling more than 650,000 to save up to £1,000 in annual compliance costs; annual accounting for Climate Change Levy; modernisation and simplification of existing regimes governing the taxation of debt and derivative contracts, repealing over 100 pages of legislation; simplification of Capital Gains Tax regime; Corporation Tax exemption for gains on substantial shareholdings; facilitation of electronic communication between building societies and their members; and removal/reduction of rustication on Credit unions to enable wider completion.

Full details of these measures can be found on this Cabinet office web linkhttp://www.cabinet-office.gov.uk/regulation/actionplan/docs/rrap.pdf)

EU Savings Directive

Dr. Kumar: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps he is taking to encourage US compliance with the automatic exchange of information on savings held by EU nationals, as covered by the EU Savings Directive. [114302]

Dawn Primarolo: Her Majesty's Government holds regular discussions with the Government of the United States, in which a range of issues are discussed.

Financial Statement and Budget Report

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether a change to the main inflation index along the lines proposed in the Budget Statement will affect the annual uprating of pensions and other benefits. [114362]

Mr. Boateng: As the Chancellor made clear in his Budget speech the Treasury review of the inflation target is being examined from a monetary policy perspective. As has already been announced the Basic State Pension will rise each year by 2.5 per cent., or by the September RPI, whichever is higher. Social security benefits will rise in the normal way.

Health and Social Care(Community Health and Standards) Bill

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment his Department has made of

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Clause 171 of the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill; and if he will make a statement. [113461]

Mr. Boateng: The provisions of the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill will help deliver greater freedoms to high performing hospitals and trusts, as announced by the Chancellor in his Budget Statement on 17 April 2002. This is in line with the Government's policy of encouraging greater devolution in the delivery of public services to Departments and to front line organisations, within a clear framework of national standards and expenditure limits.

Heavily Indebted Poor Countries

Mr. Gardiner: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will take steps with the World Bank as part of the HIPC initiative to resolve conflicts between the decisions made by the International Court for the Settlement of Investment Disputes and the obligations on heavily indebted poor countries. [113396]

John Healey: Generally the International Court for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) arbitration relates solely to the claim being considered, and need not have any bearing on how commercial debt should be treated under the Enhanced Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) more widely, which primarily focuses on the cancellation of debt acquired through borrowing, and not with claims that might arise from the possibly illegal appropriation of assets.

However, we would hope that any investor successfully claiming through ICSID would act in the spirit of the HIPC Initiative and settle for a smaller sum, in line with the Paris Club treatment of bilateral debt.

Inspectorates

Mr. Norman: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer pursuant to his answer of 9April 2203, Official Report, column 269W, on Inspectorates, what the total costs incurred by the Inland Revenue were in each year since 1997. [113400]

Dawn Primarolo: The Inland Revenue undertakes a variety of activities to monitor and ensure compliance. Chiefly, this concerns enquiries into the tax returns of individuals, businesses and companies, and reviews of employer compliance. Though figures are not available for earlier years, the number of staff engaged in this work and the staff costs to the Inland Revenue, were:

Year	Number of staff	Total staff costs—£000
1999–2000	12,622	439,689
2000–01	12,439	446,761
2001–02	13,130	490,020

This involves staff employed at different levels working in local offices, the Large Business Office and the Special Compliance Office.

National Insurance

Mr. Webb: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer for what reason his Department ceased issuing notices to people with an incomplete record of National

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Insurance contributions in a given tax year; when and how this omission was noted; how many letters will now be issued; and if he will make a statement. [114570]

Dawn Primarolo: I refer the hon. Member to my written statement to the House on 16 May 2003, Official Report, column 26WS.

Parliamentary Questions

Mr. Kenneth Clarke: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he will reply to the question tabled by the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe for answer on 28 April, ref 109374, on tax credits. [114341]

Dawn Primarolo: I answered the right hon. and learned Gentleman's question on 30 April 2003, Official Report, columns 376–77W.

My answer replied not only to question 109374 but also to questions 109369 and 109337 from the hon. Member for Pudsey (Mr. Truswell). Unfortunately, the right hon. and learned Gentleman's question was not attributed to him in the Official Report. Arrangements have been made for this error to be corrected in the Bound Volume.

State Retirement Pension

Mr. Frank Field: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what level the basic rate of income tax would have to be raised to meet the cost of raising the state retirement pension to 8 per cent. of GDP by 2050. [113547]

Mr. Boateng: It is not possible to provide accurate calculations of the revenue impact of rates of income tax as far ahead as 2050. In particular, the structure of taxation and the distribution of income are likely to change materially over the long term.

Tax

Vernon Coaker: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the impact of the new tax credits on entitlement to (a) housing benefit and (b) council tax benefit; and if he will make a statement. [113588]

Dawn Primarolo: As a result of the increased generosity of the working and child tax credits that were introduced in April 2003, it is estimated that up to 50,000 households could be floated off housing benefit, while up to 150,000 households could be floated off council tax benefit.

Mr. Willetts: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many (a) individuals and (b) households, broken down by those who are in work and those that are out of work and those in receipt of benefit and those that are not in receipt of benefit, face marginal rates of tax and benefit withdrawal of over (i) 40 per cent., (ii) 50 per cent., (iii) 60 per cent., (iv) 70 per cent., (v) 89 per cent., (vi) 90 per cent, and (vii) 100 per cent. [114413]

Mr. Boateng: This information is not readily available and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

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Mr. Burstow: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how long on average each tax office is taking to process tax returns; and how many returns have been outstanding for (a) six weeks, (b) nine weeks, (c) 12 weeks and (d) more than 12 weeks. [113533]

Dawn Primarolo: The Inland Revenue does not collect the exact information in the form requested.

Annex A—Table 1 details the rate of capture for SA Returns in respect of all return years over the past two financial years. This is shown as an age profile against the date of receipt of the return.

Annex B—Table 2 details the number of returns which remain for processing that are more than 45 days from the date of receipt.

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