Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the amount of higher rate tax relief claimed by people with personal pensions in each of the last ten years for which figures are available.

Information on the cost of pensions tax relief is published in the HM Revenue and Custom (HMRC) National Statistics table ‘Registered pension schemes: cost of tax relief’, available on GOV.UK, please find the link below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/registered-pension-schemes-cost-of-tax-relief

Estimates of the number of people making contributions into personal pensions and the value of their contributions by different income levels can be found in Table 3.8 at the link below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/deductions-and-reliefs-2010-to-2011

Estimates for previous years can be found in the national archives:

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20121102223513/http://hmrc.gov.uk/stats/income_distribution/menu-by-year.htm