§ Mr. Frank FieldTo ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many pensions scheme windups have there been in each of the past five years when the company has been(a) solvent and (b) insolvent; and how many members have been affected in each case. [86550]
§ Mr. McCartneyThe information that is available is in the tables.
There are different reasons why pension schemes are wound up. The schemes' sponsoring employer might, for example, become insolvent or the employer might decide to wind up one type of pension scheme in order to replace it with another type.
857W
year Number of schemes that completed winding up Number of members in schemes that completed winding up 1 April 1997–31 March 1998 23,953 1,139,303 1 April 1998–31 March 1999 17,196 899,679 1 April 1999–31 March 2000 12,045 786,367 1 April 2000–31 March 2001 7,446 427,509 1 April 2001– 31 March 2002 3,315 196,841 Notes:
1. The information is based on data held by the Pension Schemes Registry (PSR). It includes all types of pension schemes. The PSR registers schemes for tracing purposes and to enable it to collect the levy from all those pension schemes required to pay it. The PSR was not designed to provide comprehensive statistical data on schemes winding up. However, the information held by the PSR is the most relevant material available.
2. The PSR does not hold information about whether the sponsoring company of the pension scheme was solvent or insolvent, this information is not required for their purposes.
3. There are no figures available for the period 1 April 2002 to date, due to a change in the Pension Registry's computer system. These figures will be available after March 2003.