HC Deb 24 July 1996 vol 282 cc591-2W
Ms Lynne

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is social security expenditure as a percentage of gross domestic product and per capita in each European Union country in the current financial year. [39050]

Mr. Burt

The information is not available in the format requested. The latest available data are for 1993 and are restricted to member states at that time. This information conforms to the Eurostat definition of social protection which includes more than the usual UK definition of social security—for example, spending on health and local authority social services are included.

Current expenditure on social protection as percentage of GDP
Country Per cent
Belgium 27.6
Denmark 33.2
Germany 31.0
Greece 16.3
Spain 24.0
France 30.9
Ireland 21.4
Italy 25.8
Luxembourg 24.9
Netherlands 33.6
Portugal 18.3
United Kingdom 27.8

Current expenditure on social protection per head in the purchasing power standard1
Country £
Belgium 4,903.7
Denmark 5,598.4
Germany 5,365.7
Greece 1,598.5
Spain 2,935.7
France 5,317.6
Ireland 2,680.9
Italy 4,291.4
Luxembourg 6,630.1
Netherlands 5,576.3

Current expenditure on social protection per head in the purchasing power standard1
Country £
Portugal 1,948.3
United Kingdom 4,323.4
1 The purchasing power standard specific to private consumption is used to equivalise the per capita expenditure between the EU countries in terms of national mice levels.

1. The information is reproduced from the Eurostat publication "Social protection expenditure and receipts 1980–1993".

2. The data are provisional for all countries except Denmark.

3. UK data are for the British financial year, all other data are for the calendar year.