Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of pension rules on the (1) reduction in clinical hours, and (2) early retirement, of senior doctors.

As an individual may choose to reduce their working hours or take early retirement for a range of reasons, it is not possible to isolate the impact of any single factor such as pension rules. However, we continue to monitor the retirement patterns and hours worked by senior doctors. The available evidence does not suggest any substantial change in consultant working hours. NHS Digital workforce statistics show the participation rate or average contracted hours per person, has been stable for several years.

Data from the NHS Business Services Authority, which administer the NHS Pension Scheme, shows that number of consultants taking voluntary early retirement as a proportion of all consultant retirements has not changed significantly over the last five years.

A small but significant portion of senior doctors will amass pensions in excess of their allowances for tax-free pension saving. Last year, the Government addressed this issue by increasing thresholds by £90,000 to remove all staff with earnings below £200,000 from the scope of the taper. An estimated 96% of general practitioners and 98% of consultants are out of scope of the taper based on their National Health Service earnings.