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Administration Costs

Volume 455: debated on Tuesday 16 January 2007

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to table five on page 153 of his Department's departmental report 2006, what the Department's administration costs for (a) children, (b) working age, (c) pensioners and (d) disabled people were in each year since 1996-97. (115335)

The Department for Work and Pensions was formed in June 2001 from the Department of Social Security and parts of the former Department for Education and Employment including the Employment Service. The first departmental report produced for the Department was in 2002 (Cm 5424). The earliest year included was 1998-99. Therefore data are not available in the format requested for all years from 1996-97.

Table 1 summarises administration costs for the areas requested for the years 2000-01 to 2007-08.

Table 2 summarises administration costs for the areas requested for the years 1998-99 and 1999-2000.

The information has been extracted from the latest available departmental report for each year.

Table 1 Administration costs 2000-01 to 2007-08

2000-01

2001-02

2002-03

2003-04

2004-05

2005-06

2006-07

2007-08

Outturn

Outturn

Outturn

Outturn

Outturn

Estimated outturn

Plans

Plans

Children

248

250

293

249

256

394

408

402

Working age

3,819

2,668

2,339

2,387

2,501

2,721

2,588

2,598

Pensioners

219

419

484

571

623

641

507

Disability

1

172

167

198

219

198

Corporate and Shared Services

280

1,692

2,556

2,657

2,493

2,000

1,975

2,089

Total administration

4,347

4,830

5,607

5,949

5,988

5,936

5,831

5,794

Table 2 Administration costs 1998-99 to 1999-2000

Outturn

1998-99

1999-2000

Children

225

225

Working Age

1,695

1,694

Pensions

255

255

Disability

137

137

Corporate and Shared Services

1,780

1,779

Total administration

4,092

4,090

Notes:

1. The administration costs for previous years have been adjusted to take into account the restructuring of the Department.

2. It is important to note that the analysis of the administration budget for children, working age, pensioners and disabled people in Table 5 excludes the cost of corporate and shared services, these are shown separately in the same table. All figures provided for years prior to the formation of The Department for Work and Pensions were determined on the basis of the expenditure incurred by each of the various business areas brought together by the machinery of Government changes in 2001. Analysis of administration data in this format is not available prior to 1998-99.

3. Table 5 from the Departmental report for 2005 (Cm 6539) contains the most recent analysis of administration costs for the year 1999-2000, and Table 5 from the departmental report for 2004 (Cm 6221) contains the most recent analysis of administration costs for 1998-99. As these analyses will only have been adjusted for the structure of the Department that existed at the time the relevant departmental report was issued, they will not be directly comparable with Table 5 in the departmental report for 2006.

Sources:

Department Report 2006 (Cm 6829)

Department Report 2005 (Cm 6539)

Departmental Report 2004 (Cm 6221)