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Occupational Pensions

Volume 463: debated on Monday 23 July 2007

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what percentage of private sector employers offered pensions to their employees in each year since 1997. (150045)

The information is not available in the format requested. Such information as is available is presented in the following table:

Percentage of firms with any pension provision

1998

34

2000

29

2003

52

2005

44

Notes:

1. All figures are estimates taken from the Employers’ Pension Provision Survey. 2005 is the latest year published. The coverage of the survey is private sector employers in Great Britain.

2. Stakeholder pensions were introduced in April 2001, and from October 2001 employers with five or more employees and no other pension provision were required to provide access to stakeholder pensions. This is reflected in the increase in employer pension provision between 2000 and 2003.

3. Pension provision includes occupational schemes, group personal pensions, stakeholder pensions (including schemes with no members and/or no contributions) and firms that contribute to personal pensions.

Source:

DWP Employers’ Pension Provision Survey

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the average pension paid from occupational pension schemes was in each year since 1997, expressed in real terms. (150057)

The information requested is not available. The closest information available is the average occupational pension received by pensioner benefit units, as recorded in the Department’s Family Resources Survey and shown in the following table. Latest information relates to 2005-06, so average amounts are shown in 2005-06 prices.

Average amount of occupational pension income for those in receipt, before tax

£ per week, 2005-06 prices

Pensioner couples

Single pensioners

All pensioner units

1997-98

154

80

118

1998-99

161

83

122

1999-2000

163

86

124

2000-01

178

89

134

2001-02

182

88

137

2002-03

178

93

137

2003-04

193

93

144

2004-05

196

99

150

2005-06

192

99

146

Notes:

1. Occupational pensions include widow’s employee pensions and occupational pension from an overseas Government or company if paid in sterling. The average amount received by a pensioner benefit unit may include pensions paid from more than one occupational pension scheme.

2. Figures are for Great Britain.

3. Figures have been rounded to the nearest £.

4. Based on survey data and as such subject to a degree of sampling and non sampling error. Users should not read too much into movements in data between single years.

5. Pensioner units are either pensioner couples or single pensioners.

6. Pensioner couples are couples where one or more of the adults are state pension age or over.

Source:

Pensioners’ Income Series, 2005-06 (Revised)