§ Mrs. Bainasked the Secretary of State for Social Services when the differential between industrial death benefits and State retirement pensions was last revised; and how many widows in receipt of individual death benefits are not in receipt of State retirement pensions.
§ Mr. OrmeThe differential between the basic rate of industrial death benefit for a widow and the national insurance widow's pension has been maintained at a constant amount since 30th October 1967. There is no specific differential between death benefit and retirement pension. Allowances paid to widows for children are the same under both schemes. Other industrial death benefits have no counterpart in the State scheme. A widow can only receive a national insurance retirement pension in full, in addition to industrial death benefit pension, if she has qualified for it by paying full contributions herself. In other circumstances the widow receives the amount of whichever is the higher of the two benefits. I regret that to obtain the figures requested would involve a disproportionate amount of time and effort. Of course, many of the 30,000 widows receiving industrial death benefit are below the age for retirement pension anyway.