§ Mr. Alfred Morrisasked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) by how much expenditure has increased each year on cash benefits for disabled people introduced by the previous Government; and what have been the savings on such expenditure since the link with earnings was removed;
(2) what has been the increase in real terms in spending on cash benefits for disabled people other than that on benefits introduced by the previous Government;
(3) what was the increase in real terms in spending on cash benefits for disabled people in each of the years 1973–74 to 1983–84.
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§ Mr. NewtonExpenditure on cash benefits for long-term sick and disabled people from 1973–74 to 1983–84 was as follows:
Year *Benefits introduced by the previous government 1974–79 †Other benefits Cash £ million At 1983–84 prices £ million Cash £ million At 1983–84 prices £ million 1973–74 — — 570 2,000 1974–75 — — 740 2,220 1975–76 12 29 990 2,370 1976–77 44 91 1,160 2,410 1977–78 67 122 1,400 2,560 1978–79 120 202 1,660 2,790 1979–80 168 244 1,930 2,800 1980–81 238 297 2,260 2,820 1981–82 309 346 2,650 2,970 1982–83 398 417 3,080 3,220 1983–84 496 496 3,570 3,570 * Invalid care allowance, mobility allowance and non-contributory invalidity pension. † Attendance allowance, industrial disablement benefit, invalidity benefit and the appropriate share of expenditure on war pension, supplementary benefit, housing benefit and the Christmas bonus. All figures rounded because of the imprecision arising from the need to apportion expenditure on the latter four benefits. Estimates of the additional expenditure that would have resulted if the link with the increase of prices or earnings whichever was the greater had been maintained would involve making assumptions about forecasts, the treatment of forecasting errors and about which benefits had been uprated by this method, which would make such figures meaningless.