The Assistance Board inform me that they made their arrangements on the basis that the number of new supplementary pensions resulting from the new legislation might reach 250,000. There were, however, no data on which a close estimate could be based. The Board are making inquiries into the extent to which pensioners who applied unsuccessfully for supplementary pensions under the previous Regulations may have failed to realise that a fresh application is necessary if they wish their cases to be reconsidered. As I stated in reply to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths) on Tuesday last, the number of persons already receiving supplementary pensions who benefited from the provisions of the new legislation up to August last was about 216,000.