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7 Mar 2006 : Column 1296W—continued

Child Benefit

Mr. Byers: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of (a) the percentage of those entitled to claim child benefit who do not do so and (b) the amount that went unclaimed in each of the last five years. [56160]

Dawn Primarolo: Precise figures are not available, but it is estimated that approximately 2 per cent. of families although entitled, do not claim child benefit.

There are no estimates available for the amount that went unclaimed in each of the last five years.

Commercial Waste

Mr. Keetch: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will consider awarding extra funding to local authorities to collect and recycle commercial waste. [56706]

 
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John Healey: The Government are currently consulting on their Review of Waste Strategy. Decisions on waste spending will be taken in the context of the Comprehensive Spending Review in 2007.

Cot Death

Mr. Oaten: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many post-neonatal babies died from cot death in the period covered by the most recent statistics produced by the Office for National Statistics; and how many such deaths would have been recorded in that period if the rate for post-neonatal first babies inside marriage were applied to all post-neonatal babies. [56731]

John Healey: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician who has been asked to reply.

Letter from Colin Mowl, dated 7 March 2006:

The National Statistician has been asked to reply to your recent question on how many postneonatal babies died from cot death in the period covered by the most recent statistics produced by the Office for National Statistics; and how many such babies would have died in that period if the rate for postneonatal first babies inside marriage was applied to all postneonatal babies. I am replying in her absence. (56731)

Available figures on cot deaths are based on a mention of sudden infant death", cot death", sudden infant death syndrome" or some other similar term on the death certificate. This figure is referred to as sudden infant deaths" in routine publications.

In 2004 (the latest year for which provisional figures are available) there were 149 sudden infant deaths in the postneonatal period in England and Wales (0.23 deaths per 1,000 live births). Seven of these were among first babies born inside marriage (0.05 deaths per 1,000 live births). If this rate had applied to all live births in 2004, then 29 babies would have died from sudden infant deaths in the postneonatal period.

Diamonds

Keith Vaz: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of (a) the proportion of diamonds sold in the UK in each of the last five years for which such estimates are available which were smuggled and (b) the consequent cost to the economy of the UK in lost tax revenues. [52887]

Dawn Primarolo: HM Revenue and Customs do not produce estimates in relation to the smuggling of diamonds. Their report Measuring Indirect Tax Losses", available on their website at http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/pbr2005/index.htm provides estimates of indirect tax losses arising from fraud, avoidance and other forms of non-compliance but does not provide specific information on the trade in diamonds.

Euro

Mr. Pickles: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) if he will place in the Library a copy of the Valuation Office Agency's plan on preparing for the introduction of the euro; [54554]

(2) if he will place in the Library a copy of the Valuation Office Agency's high level plan for the introduction of the euro. [54614]

 
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Dawn Primarolo: The Valuation Office Agency does not have a separate euro preparations plan. Their planning is included in the strategy for HM Revenue and Customs as a whole.

Government Liablities

Mr. Newmark: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will estimate the Government's liability arising from schemes under (a) the private finance initiative, (b) public sector pension provision and (c) other contingent liabilities which do not appear on the Government's balance sheet in each year since 1997. [54607]

Mr. Des Browne: The information is as follows.

(a) The estimated Government liability arising from both previous and future PFI projects is publicly available information. This data can be found in previous Budget publications (available online at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk).

(b) The chief secretary explained the latest position on public sector pension liabilities in his answer to the oral question from Mr. Philip Dunne (4130 05/06), answered on the 2 March and placed a paper in the House of Commons Library the same day providing a full explanation of the latest estimate.

(c) Each year estimates of Government's contingent liabilities are provided in resource accounts.

Household Repairs (VAT)

Mr. Evans: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make it his policy to incentivise property owners and landlords to (a) return existing properties to housing use and (b) improve the quality of private housing stock by (i) reducing and (ii) removing VAT on household repairs. [56348]

Dawn Primarolo: We keep under review the use of reduced rates for construction work where these could help support regeneration and renewal, and to date have targeted relief at areas of specific need, such as certain residential conversions (including converting a non-residential property into single household dwellings or converting a house into flats) and the renovation of housing that has been empty for more than three years. These measures have helped bring vacant homes back into use and create new homes through better use of the UK's existing housing stock. However, a blanket reduced rate for all household repairs is unlikely to be an efficient or well-targeted use of resources.

While agreements with our European partners allow us to keep our zero rates as they currently stand, we cannot extend them or introduce new ones.

Income Tax

Mr. Pickles: To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimated revenue would be raised by increasing the rate of basic rate income tax by one per cent. [56190]

Dawn Primarolo: The information requested is available in Table 4 'Direct effects of illustrative changes in income tax" from the publication Tax ready reckoner and tax reliefs, December 2005', which is available in the
 
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House of Commons Library, or on the HMT website at http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/fa1/96/pbr05 taxreadyreckoner 223.pdf

Iraq

Mr. Harper: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer on which dates he visited British soldiers injured in Iraq; and what locations were visited. [54099]

Mr. Gordon Brown: I regularly meet members of the armed forces, veterans and their families on my visits around the UK and in my constituency.

Leases

Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what assessment he has made of the likely impact of the proposed legislation governing the tax treatment of leases on (a) leasing, (b) the wider financial services industry and (c) small and medium-sized enterprises; [54519]

(2) what assessment he has made of the likely impact of the proposed legislation governing the tax treatment of leases on future levels of business investment; [54520]

(3) what assessment he has made of the likely impact of the proposed legislation governing the tax treatment of leases on the (a) road haulage, (b) shipping, (c) railways, (d) manufacturing and (e) air travel and freight industry. [54521]

Dawn Primarolo: An assessment of the likely impact of the proposals to reform the taxation of leased plant and machinery is contained in a partial regulatory impact assessment (RIA), available at http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/ria/leasing-reform.pdf.

A final RIA, with a full assessment of these issues, will be published with legislation, following the Chancellor's Budget statement.

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