§ Baroness MACLEOD of BORVEasked Her Majesty's Government:
What would be the cost to public funds if widows had their National Insurance widows' pensions disregarded 170WA in assessing entitlement to, and payment of, sickness benefit and unemployment benefit; and whether they will estimate how many widows would benefit annually.
§ Lord WELLS-PESTELLIt is thought that some 200,000 widow beneficiaries may be following a gainful occupation and, if they all paid full contributions giving title to National Insurance benefits, the cost of disregarding their widow's benefits would be of the order of £5 million for sickness benefit, £15 million for invalidity benefit, and £5 million for unemployment benefit. It is thought that more than one half of the insured widows would claim an additional benefit each year, and about 25,000 would be receiving two benefits at any one time. The full cost would not however accrue until the widow's contribution option has been fully phased out, though it would be expected that more widows would choose to pay if duplication of benefits was allowed.
It would however be difficult to limit duplication to sickness benefit, invalidity benefit and unemployment benefit and the main cost of duplication would then arise in respect of widows over pensionable age. This would be expected to build up to over £1,000 million a year at current rates.