§ Mr. FlightTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on why in figure 3.1 of the Department of Health annual report 2003 the cost of
1330Wexpenditure, in cash terms, which is represented by the resource and capital allocations to health authorities and NHS trusts in (a) 1996–97, (b) 1997–98, (c) 1998–99, (d) 1999–2000 and (e) 2000–01; and if he will give this as a percentage of the total Department of Health budget for these years and for each year from 2001–02 to 2005–06. [129124]
§ Mr. HuttonThe information requested is shown in the tables
NHS pensions for 2001–02 is almost twice as high as that in any other year; and why it was decided to issue the figures without an explanatory note. [130885]
§ Mr. HuttonThe national health service pensions figures in figure 3.1 of the Department's annual report 2003 shows the request for resource figure. This resource based expenditure figure comprises primarily of the increase in total scheme liability plus the interest payable on the total liability, less income receivable including employer and employee contributions and transfers into the scheme.
The relatively large increase in 2001–02, is as a result of two factors.
The first was the one-off strengthening of assumptions used by the Government Actuaries Department for calculating the total liability of the NHS pension scheme.
The second was the updating of base data used for the actuarial assessment of total NHS pension liability.