§ Mr. Frank FieldTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is his estimate of the cost of uprating the retirement pensions payable to present or former United Kingdom citizens living in those countries where uprating has not hitherto been payable(a) to restore them to the level at which the pension would have been payable if they had remained resident in the United Kingdom (i) with and (ii) without full backdated payments and (b) as if the only uprating payable to them since leaving the United Kingdom were that coming into payment in the current year; and if he will estimate separate totals in each case for British pensioners resident in (1) Australia, (2) Canada and (3) New Zealand. [17344]
957W
§ Mr. ArbuthnotSuch information as is available is in the table:
£ millions Country (a) Estimated cost of paying fully indexed pensions (b) Estimated cost of paying April 1994 uprating only Australia 110 7 Canada 60 4 New Zealand 20 2 Rest of the world 45 3 Total 235 16 Notes:
1. The estimated costs relate to all state retirement and widow pensioners living abroad whose benefits are not uprated. Separate figures are not available on the cost of uprating benefits only for retirement pensioners or those who are, or were, citizens of the United Kingdom.
2. An estimate of the cost of backdating payments to make good upratings forgone in the past is not available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.