§ Mr. WebbTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will estimate the percentage of national income accounted for by expenditure on National Insurance retirement pensions in each year from 1996–97 to 2001–02, taking account of the measures contained in Cm 4917; and if he will provide those estimates to two decimal places. [138231]
§ Mr. RookerThe information is in the table which, for completeness, also shows expenditure on other benefits paid to pensioners. All figures are rounded to two decimal places; for this reason they may not appear to sum to the total, which is also correct to two decimal places.
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Expenditure as a percentage of GDP1 1996–97 1997–98 1998–99 1999–2000 2000–01 2001–02 (a) Retirement Pensions2 4.17 4.11 4.14 4.17 4.10 4.24 (b) Winter Fuel Payments 0.00 0.02 0.02 0.10 0.18 0.13 (c) Means-tested benefits for pensioners3 1.13 1.06 1.00 1.00 1.00 1.05 (d) Other benefits paid to pensioners4 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.02 0.02 (e) Concessionary TV Licences 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.04 0.04 Total 5.32 5.21 5.18 5.28 5.33 5.47 1 The information is based on expenditure figures consistent with the Pre-Budget Report, and is compared with the latest GDP figures published by National Statistics on 27 September 2000 2 Includes Retirement Pension basic and earnings-related components 3 Includes Income Support/Minimum Income Guarantee, Social Fund payments, Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit paid to people aged 60 and over 4 Includes non-contributory Retirement Pension and Christmas Bonus (contributory and non-contributory)