Proposed cessation of the following Official Statistics: Location of UK armed forces pension and compensation recipients
Published 2 January 2024
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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/proposed-cessation-of-the-following-official-statistics-location-of-uk-armed-forces-pension-and-compensation-recipients/proposed-cessation-of-the-following-official-statistics-location-of-uk-armed-forces-pension-and-compensation-recipients
Summary
The Ministry of Defence (MOD) publishes an Official Statistic on the Location of UK armed forces pension and compensation recipients. We are seeking users’ views on the cessation of this report.
Background
The Location of UK armed forces pension and compensation recipients Official Statistic presents the number of people in receipt of an occupational pension under the Armed Forces Pension Scheme (AFPS 75 & 05), the number in receipt of compensation under the War Pensions Scheme (WPS) and the number awarded compensation under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS), by country, region, county, local authority, local health authority, parliamentary constituency and postcode district. It only includes approximately 18% of all veterans as it does not include those in receipt of a pension under AFPS 15 or those veterans not in receipt of any pension or compensation.
It was originally developed to provide an estimate of where veterans were located by using pension and compensation data held by the MOD, as at the time, no-one held data on the location of all veterans. It was also developed following a high number of external requests for information from UK government authorities and UK health authorities seeking estimates of veterans residing within their catchment areas that may be more likely to require access to local health and social care services.
Reasons for proposed change
The release of the England and Wales 2021 Census data and the upcoming release of the Scotland 2022 Census data provides more accurate and comprehensive veteran location information that better reflects the entire veteran population.
Further, the ONS plan to release a publication in 2023 on the self-reported general health of UK armed forces veterans in England and Wales, including the number of veterans with long-term health conditions or disabilities, which will provide health and social care providers with better information than currently available to support delivery of their services.
Timings
The consultation will run for six weeks from Tuesday 2 January 2024. This consultation complies with the Government’s Code of Practice on Consultations. All responses will be taken into consideration on how to proceed however, if there are no objections during the consultation period, the publication of this report will automatically cease.
Responding to the Consultation
We invite the feedback of our users and are keen to understand what impact the cessation of this report will have on you.
How to respond
If you have any comments on the proposed cessation of this report, please email them to Analysis-Health-PQ-FOI@mod.gov.uk stating ‘Location of armed forces pension and compensation recipients consultation’ in the subject, by 13 February 2024.
When sending your comments please include contact details (your name and either e-mail address, postal address or telephone number) so that we can follow up if clarification is needed.
If there are any issues experienced when using the above email address please forward any comments to: Analysis-Publications@mod.gov.uk
Consultation Outcome
To support transparency in our decision-making process, a summary of the responses to this consultation will be made public. No names of individuals or organisations who respond to the consultation will be published.