Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Spring Budget 2023, HC1183, published on 15 March 2023, if he will make an estimate of the number and proportion of (a) health professionals and (b) other NHS employees whose pension contributions have previously crossed the annual pension tax threshold and who would have been expected to pay the lifetime allowance charge but will no longer do so as a result of its abolition.

In 2020/21, the latest full tax year for which data is available, the NHS Business Services Authority issued 27,395 pension saving statements to all staff for whom the value of their National Health Service pension benefits in that tax year had increased in excess of the £40,000 Annual Allowance. In the same year, there were 1,615 Lifetime Allowance charges paid over to HM Revenue & Customs in respect of NHS pensions claimed. It is not possible to break down this data by occupation.

Looking ahead, estimates based on projected pension scheme data indicate that in 2023/24 around 22,000 senior NHS clinicians could be expected to exceed the former £40,000 Annual Allowance, and around 31,000 clinicians would have reached at least 75% of the abolished £1.073 million Lifetime Allowance. No estimate has been made for other NHS employees.