HC Deb 28 November 2001 vol 375 c911W
Mr. Clappison

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many(a) pensioners, (b) widows of pensioners and (c) their estates were identified as entitled to tax free pensions under the pre-1973 Attributable Tax Exercise of 1999; and how many fell into the same categories in cases arising from aggravated invaliding. [18006]

Dr. Moonie

We do not have available figures for the numbers of pre-1973 Royal Navy and Royal Air Force pensioners, widows of pensioners or estates entitled to tax free attributable pensions. This information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. However, tax exemption was applied as appropriate in these cases.

The number of pre-1973 Army pensions, widows of pensioners or their estates identified as entitled to tax free pensions is as follows:

  1. (a) 182 pre-1973 pensioners.
  2. (b) 73 pre-1973 widows.
  3. (c) Nil estates.

In these cases, as well as 787 post-1973 cases, tax exemption was not applied correctly. However this has been remedied in all but 26 cases, which are still under investigation.