Over £1.06bn has been paid out to Equitable Life policyholders through the government’s payments scheme.
Since the last progress report in February, the scheme has issued payments to a further 6,000 policy holders, meaning that over 902,000 eligible policyholders have now been sent tax-free payments.
The figures break down to 414,429 payments for individual investors, totalling £563m, 37,921 payments to with-profits annuitants or their estates, totalling £331.2m, and 450,158 payments to those who bought policies through their company pension scheme, totalling £171.3m.
The scheme was set up by the government in 2011 to make fair and transparent payments to policyholders who suffered financial losses as a result of government maladministration which occurred in the regulation of Equitable Life.
The June progress report noted that 87 per cent of eligible policyholders have now been traced and had a payment issued, representing nearly 92 per cent of the total amount estimated to be due.
There remain approximately 136,000 policyholders who are due a payment, but where the scheme has not been able to trace or validate their address.
A separate announcement from the Treasury confirmed that the government has sold a further 1 per cent shareholding in Lloyds Banking Group through the trading plan launched in December, taking the total raised for the taxpayer to over £12bn and reducing the state shareholding to below 17 per cent.
The trading plan is set to end no later than 31 December 2015.
peter.walker@ft.com
