§ Mr. Wareingasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what steps he has taken to inform disabled people of their right to claim either non-contributory invalidity pension or the housewives' non-contributory invalidity pension prior to the introduction of the severe disablement allowance; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. NewtonI refer the hon. Member to my reply to him on 23 October at column570–71.
§ Mr. Wareingasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many disabled people have applied for (a) the non-contributory invalidity pension, and (b) the housewives' non-contributory invalidity pension since 1 January; and how many were successful in their claim.
§ Mr. NewtonI regret that information is not available in the form requested. However, some 14,000 new and renewal claims for housewives' non-contributory invalidity pension were received in the period up to the end of September and the number of awards was 10,500. During the same period some 12,000 claims for non-contributory invalidity pension were received. No details are available of the number of awards, but a large proportion of claims are likely to be successful.
These figures are in addition to those of the claims arriving out of our special exercise for people currently on supplementary benefit, on which I answered a question from the hon. Member on 23 October at column 570–71.