§ Mr. Frank FieldTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much of the investment in(a) personal equity plans and (b) tax-exempt special savings accounts is new investment; if he will estimate the proportion and sources diverted from other forms of savings; and if he will list the research his Department has (i) commissioned and (ii) evaluated in respect of this data. [15195]
§ Mr. JackBoth PEPs and TESSAs have been very successful in achieving the objectives, respectively, of widening share ownership and encouraging longer-term saving. The most directly relevant research on savings is based on 1991 market research data from RSGB Ltd.,338W from which Inland Revenue purchased additional analyses, and on work that is now part of the Institute for Fiscal Studies savings project, for which HM Treasury and Inland Revenue are among the sponsors, using data from the financial research survey. Both sources suggest that most of the funds going to TESSAs do not represent new savings, which a considerable amount coming from other deposit accounts, but for PEPs the IFS work so far suggests that there may be a somewhat greater element of new equity investment.