§ Mr. CousinsTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what proportion of members of the NHS pension scheme had qualifying survivor partners on their death in each of the last five years, broken down by members who died in service, members who died during deferral, and pensioner members. [104269]
§ Mr. DenhamResponsibility for this matter has been delegated to the NHS Pensions Agency under its Chief Executive, Mr. A. F. Cowan. I have asked him to reply to my hon. Friend.
Letter from A. F. Cowan to Mr. Jim Cousins, dated 31 January 2000:
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question regarding the proportion of members of the NHS Pension Scheme who had qualifying survivor partners on their death as it falls within my area of responsibility.The NHS Pension Scheme only pays survivor benefits to legal spouses or dependant children. Widower's benefits were only generally available from 6 April 1988.Unfortunately the Agency's current systems do not allow me to provide the proportion of members who died in service, or during deferral, and had qualifying partners on their death.The information in respect of pensioner members is as follows:
Year Proportion of pensioner members with qualifying survivor partners on their death (%) 1995 30 1996 30 1997 29 1998 28 1999 27
The Government Actuary's last report, covering the period from 1989–1994, assumed an average 50% of pensioner members would have qualifying partner survivors.The difference between the actuarial assumption and the experience over the last 5 years is due to the high proportion of women represented in the number of pensioner deaths whose husbands pre-deceased them or were not entitled to widower's pensions.