Written question asked by David Laws (Liberal Democrat) on Monday, 25 June 2007, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 27 June 2007. It was answered by James Plaskitt (Labour) on Monday, 9 July 2007 on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.

Social Security

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the cost was of income support back to work bonus payments in each year since their creation.

Answer

The information is not available in the format requested. The available information about back to work bonus payments is in the following table.

Income support customers paid back to work bonuses: Great Britain
	Total claims paid	Total amount paid (£)
1999	14,560	5,838,442
2000	16,650	7,017,631
2001	15,340	6,757,296
2002	14,650	6,550,321
2003¹	11,840	5,489,155
2004²	12,280	6,086,704
2005²	930	488,274
¹ 2003 figures exclude May 2003. These figures are not available due to system errors. ² There are no new claims to the back to work bonus scheme after October 2004 and only transitional claims up to January 2005. Notes: 1. Figures are taken from ISCS 100 per cent. monthly scans and are given as annual figures (i.e. the sum from January to December each year) where applicable. 2. Caseloads have been rounded to the nearest 10. 3. Total amounts are rounded to the nearest pound. 4. Figures are not available prior to January 1999. Source: ISCS 100 per cent. monthly scans.

Secondary information