Pensions Uprating (UK Pensioners Living Overseas)

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House notes with concern that the pensions of 550,000 UK pensioners residing in a number of overseas countries will no longer be uprated; is further concerned that this unfairness will lead to hardship for overseas pensioners and that this measure will discourage many UK citizens living in the UK from returning to their country of origin as many wish to do in their retirement; regrets that the Government has taken this action which will lead to loneliness and anger among UK pensioners living abroad; and calls on the Government to withdraw this measure and pay UK pensioners at home and abroad their due state pension with the same uprating adjustment in the interests of fairness and equity.

I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate.

I tabled early-day motion 1235 praying that the uprating regulations, which deny 550,000 of our pensioners their full pension entitlement, be annulled. That motion had the support of 97 Members from eight parties, including the Government party, as well as independent Members. This matter has cross-party support, and I hope that today the Government will reflect on the injustice that many face and the strength of that cross-party support.

The policy of not awarding increases has been followed by successive Governments and continues with the introduction of the new state pension that was introduced this April. People’s rights to their full UK pension are determined by the country they live in. There are 640,000 UK pensioners living in overseas countries where the UK meets its full obligation, but sadly there are 550,000 pensioners living in countries where annual uprating does not take place and pensions are frozen.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

For the benefit of those who pick up the beginning of this debate and do not necessarily stay for the details at the end, does the hon. Gentleman agree that nobody intended this injustice to start? It started because in the 1950s there was no provision for uprating. Other countries introduced uprating, and no one bothered to say, “This is crazy”.

[Ian Blackford]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I agree that an anomaly exists. There is no logic whereby pensioners living in the US, for example, can benefit from their pension, but those in Canada cannot. It is a question of justice. That is why I am asking all Members across the House to unite on a matter that should concern us all. It is about doing the right thing, and I hope that today the Minister and the Government will respond correctly.

The pensions legislation provided for the additional state pension to be uprated at least in line with earnings. It also provided for the current policy on state pension uprating overseas to continue. Thus pensioners who would have been entitled to upratings if they retired in the UK are no longer entitled to that increased payment simply because they live in certain overseas countries. Pensions will be uprated only in a European Union country or one with which the UK has a reciprocal agreement. There are 16 such non-European Union countries, including the USA, Israel, Turkey and the republics of the former Yugoslavia. The agreements with Canada and New Zealand and the former agreement with Australia do not provide for uprating. Between them those three countries account for around 80% of overseas residents who do not get their full pension entitlement.

We are talking about individuals who have paid national insurance in anticipation of receiving a full UK state pension. We often talk about a postcode lottery; in this case it is a national lottery, with 550,000 pensioners paying the price—entitlement to a full pension based not on their national insurance contributions, but on the country they live in. How can that be fair? If they live in the US Virgin Islands, their pension rights are protected, but if they live in the British Virgin Islands, those rights are not protected. The debate today is about fairness. It should not be about where pensioners live.

Pensions, after all, are a contract. They are not a benefit. It is only fair and just that a British pensioner who chooses to enjoy their retirement overseas should receive the same amount as a British pensioner who chooses to remain in the United Kingdom. Either they have an entitlement or they do not.

[Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)]

If people pay in, the pension should pay out, regardless of their address.

[Ian Blackford]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that very succinct comment. That is exactly the point. This should be about what are often called British values of fairness. If people have paid into a pension, they should get their entitlement with the annual uprating. There is no excuse for us not to do that. Why do we seem to have different classes of pensioners? It is morally unjust and truly unfair for the Government to strip pensioners of their right to equal state provision. Overseas pensioners are entitled to fairness. The state pension is a right, not a privilege.

I look forward to the Minister responding later in the debate, but I hope that we do not hear what we have heard before—that it is all about cost. It is about doing the right thing and recognising that all pensioners deserve to be treated fairly. We should focus today on the 550,000 pensioners who are losing out, but there is a topical dimension to this debate as well. What are the implications for the 400,000 UK pensioners living in EU countries if there is a Brexit vote in a few weeks’ time? In the other place, Baroness Altmann, responding on 3 March to a parliamentary question of 23 February, stated:

“Of course there is uncertainty about how a vote to leave the EU could impact on access to pensioner benefits for UK pensioners living in other parts of Europe.”

What are we to make of that? There is no clarity at all in that answer from the Government. Are the 550,000 pensioners with frozen pensions likely to be joined by others if there is a Brexit vote?

The Government could say today that irrespective of that vote, those living in EU countries will have their pensions protected. Will the Minister do that today? Will he assure our pensioners living in EU countries that their pension will not be affected by a Brexit vote? That is a simple request. It is easy for the Minister to respond appropriately and remove the uncertainty for UK pensioners living in Europe.

The Government want to lift the limit on the period that UK citizens living abroad can vote from 15 years to their entire lifetime. Why would the Government want to confer voting rights on UK pensioners, but deny them full pension rights? What drives the decision-making process of this Government? Is it cost savings, or will they accept our obligations to meet our commitment to paying pensions, regardless of country of residence? I appreciate that the Minister will no doubt have been told by the Treasury to offer nothing. The Minister is a loyal Government servant and I understand his position, but let me help him to strengthen his case with the Treasury.

The present Chancellor of the Exchequer, during a debate on the Pensions Bill in the 2003-04 Session, when shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said:

“If the system worked in the way that most people think, it would not matter where a person lived”––[Official Report, Pensions Public Bill Committee, 18 March 2004; c. 256.]

I have not said this before, but on this occasion I agree with the Chancellor: it should not matter where a person lives.

I appeal to the Minister to reflect on those words from his colleague, the present Chancellor. He spoke those words while in opposition, but each and every one of us should be judged by our deeds in government. It is not good enough to say the right thing when in opposition, and then, when in government, claim that it is all about cost. Let us today do the right thing. Let us unite in the House, standing up for all our pensioners, regardless of domicile.

I look forward to hearing voices from all sides of the Chamber. I look forward to hearing the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) speaking from the Labour Front Bench. She said at a meeting of the all-party parliamentary group on frozen pensions on 2 February this year, “The situation is unfair, illogical and doesn’t make sense.” I agree with those sentiments. If the House divides on the motion, I hope Members on both sides of the Chamber will stand shoulder to shoulder with all the pensioners who are seeking their full pension rights.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend mentioned the all-party group on frozen British pensions. He and the Chamber might be interested to know that he has just been elected as a vice-chair of the all-party group on women against state pension inequality and that my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mhairi Black) has been elected as co-chair—the meeting at which that happened was absolutely crowded. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that these injustices on pensions issues seem to run like a thread throughout UK Government policy? It really is time to resolve the WASPI issue and the overseas pensioners issue.

[Ian Blackford]

I thank my hon. Friend for that news—I did not even know that I was up for election. He is absolutely right: we are talking today about frozen pensions, but women born in the 1950s also face injustices. Many of us on both sides of the Chamber have engaged in the debate about that, and the fight goes on. Given the importance of these issues, I have suggested to the Minister that we should take some of them out of the Chamber and have a pensions commission that can look holistically at them. We can then make sure that we get them right and accept the obligations we all have to look after our pensioners, whether that is the women born in the 1950s or the frozen pensioners who are suffering.

I acknowledge that there is a cost to the Government in unfreezing pensions, but the resulting increased migration would offer them savings to help pay for doing that. In 2010, an Oxford Economics study using Government statistics showed that a pensioner who permanently leaves the UK saves the UK £7,700 a year in NHS usage and other age-related benefits, while the lost income in relation to such a pensioner would amount to £3,900—a net saving to the Exchequer of £3,800 at 2010 prices or £4,300 at today’s prices.

Many people living in the UK today perhaps came from the Caribbean or the Indian subcontinent and worked here all their lives, but those who want to go back to their country of origin cannot do so, because they risk being penalised by a frozen pension. We must help those who want to do that, as well as UK pensioners who live overseas. This is, therefore, not just about the gross cost of increased pension spending; there is an element of potentially reduced commitments to pensioners who seek to leave the UK to be with loved ones abroad or to return to their country of origin.

Those subject to frozen pensions have waited long enough to see this matter debated in the House. We must not let them down. We need to speak up for those pensioners living in the UK who want to move abroad to be with loved ones who have emigrated and those who came to work here and who wish to return to their country of origin, but who are fearful of the impact. There is a host of reasons why a pensioner may choose to move abroad in later life; it is simply wrong to punish them for making such a choice.

Pensioners who have paid the required national insurance contributions during their working lives, in the expectation of a decent basic pension in retirement, will find themselves living on incomes that fall in real terms year on year. Paying national insurance contributions to qualify for a state pension is mandatory. All recipients of the British state pension have made these contributions, and it is clearly unfair to differentiate payment levels.

Pensioners will now face ending their days in poverty because they chose to live in the “wrong” country—in most cases with no knowledge of the implications of their choice for their pension. Some people are being forced back to the UK—away from the family they love—just to secure an income they can survive on.

Reform would bring the UK in line with international norms, as most other developed countries now pay their state pension equivalents in the way I propose. We are, I am sad to say, the only country in the OECD that does not pay pensions irrespective of domicile. That should shame us all. Why are we the only country that does not accept our moral responsibility to our pensioners? That must change.

We know the statistics—that 550,000 people are affected—but behind those numbers are 550,000 human stories. Let me take three examples of the human cost of freezing state pensions. Abhik Bonnerjee, now 73, moved from India to Glasgow in 1960. He worked in the UK for 38 years—in shipbuilding, steel manufacture and the food industry. He also owned a restaurant for six years.

Abhik returned to India in 1997 and reached the state pension age in 2008, when it was paid at £87.30 a week. He made all the required national insurance contributions, and if he was still in the UK today, he would be getting not £87 but the full UK state pension. The decline in his real-terms income has left Abhik concerned about losing his home. He now feels he may have to move back to the UK. Why are we putting such a gentleman in such a position?

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend gives a very good personal example. Is there not also a paradox? Abhik faces the dilemma of returning to the UK, but if he does return, not only will his pension be uprated to the full amount, but he will be able to access health and social care, so, as well as the disruption to this person’s life, there would also be a further cost to the UK Government.

[Ian Blackford]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. This is not just about someone who comes back to the UK to live. Oddly enough, if such individuals came back to the UK for a holiday, they would collect their full UK state pension when they were here. The whole thing is just daft; we need to normalise it and accept our full responsibilities.

Let me give the example of Rita Young. She is 78 and lives in Peterborough, in the UK. She retired in 2002, aged 67, having enjoyed a long career in market research and as a community volunteer. Rita’s son moved to work in Australia some time ago and now has a family there. Since being widowed, Rita has wanted to join her son and grandchildren, but she has felt unable to do so because of the prospect of a frozen pension.

As Rita gets older, she finds daily life increasingly difficult, especially as she does not have a family around her to rely on. She is deeply saddened that she is not able to be with her family during the later stages of her life. She said:

“I have worked and contributed to my state pension all my life. It doesn’t seem fair that the government can just stop uprating it because I want to be with my family.”

That is the human cost of frozen pensions.

Lastly, there is former college lecturer Anne Puckridge, now 91. She lived and worked in the UK all her working life, paying mandatory national insurance contributions throughout. In 2002, aged 77, she finally retired and decided to move to Canada to be with her daughter and grandchildren, who had moved to Calgary. Fourteen years on, Anne, who served as an intelligence officer in the Women’s Royal Naval Service in the second world war, is struggling to live on a frozen pension of £75.50 a week.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the fact that the majority of Commonwealth nations are part of this process where pensions are frozen is a slap in the face for those who served not only this country but the Commonwealth in the second world war and in conflicts after that? In this year, when we have so many commemorations, unfreezing pensions would be a worthwhile exercise and would show that we value the worth of these people.

[Ian Blackford]

Absolutely. We owe a debt of gratitude to these people, and we should recognise that. My hon. Friend talks about the Commonwealth, and the arrangements are not reciprocal, because a Canadian pensioner who moved here would get their full pension. We need to make sure that our pensioners living in Canada are treated in the same way.

Anne feels that she will be forced to move back to the United Kingdom because her pension will no longer cover her day-to-day expenses, and she is increasingly reliant on her daughter to get by. She said:

“It’s the small things, and the injustice, that is really getting to me. I value my independence, but I can’t go on living on the breadline and I don’t want to inflict this on my family. As well as ever-increasing poverty, I feel a sense of stress and shame, which is affecting my health.”

For Abhik, Rita, Anne and all those who are not getting what is rightfully theirs, let this House today send a clear and unequivocal message to the Government that we want all our pensioners, regardless of domicile, to receive what is rightfully theirs: a full state pension. Today we can take the first steps towards fixing this injustice and delivering fairness for all our pensioners.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Shailesh Vara)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), and all those on the Order Paper who support the motion, on securing the debate on this very important subject. For the sake of clarity, I would like to point out a flaw in the motion. It seems to indicate that it is this Government who have introduced the measure, when it states

“will no longer be uprated”

and

“regrets that the Government has taken this action”.

I would simply point out to the hon. Gentleman that this policy has been consistent for 70 years. It is not something that this Government have done.

[Ian Blackford]

I made it clear in my speech that I recognise that this has been happening since the 1940s. I absolutely acknowledge that. This has happened under all Governments. None the less, we have the opportunity today to respond to it in the correct manner.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

rose—

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[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. He is being very generous with his time. Will he not accept that every other OECD country allows their pensioners who live abroad to collect their pension? Why are we standing against this? We are not talking about people getting something they are not entitled to, whether they have moved abroad before they have retired. We are talking about them getting something they are entitled to because they have made national insurance contributions. That is what we are denying them.

[Mr Vara]

It is important that we do not just look at this from one narrow perspective. The hon. Gentleman says that people have paid national insurance and are therefore entitled to this. As I say, there are other aspects involved. For example, there is the element of individual choice. When people think about going abroad, it is not purely this issue that will determine whether they will live here or abroad.

Over the years, the UK has entered into a number of reciprocal agreements with other countries. Although most provide for payment of upratings, that is not the primary purpose of reciprocal social security agreements. They are intended mainly to provide a measure of co-ordination between social security schemes to protect the social security of workers moving between the two countries during their working lives. They prevent employees, their employers and the self-employed from needing to pay social security contributions to both the home state and the state of employment at the same time to get access to social security benefits. Of course, social security agreements vary to some extent from country to country, depending on the nature and scope of the other country’s social security scheme. It should also be noted that the UK is not alone in applying restrictions on payment of state pensions abroad. In some respects, the UK arrangements are less restrictive than those that apply in other countries.

The crux of the issue is individual choice. Those who have contributed to the UK state pension scheme are free to draw their entitlement from wherever they choose to live. The rules governing the uprating of pensions are straightforward and widely publicised. If a person chooses to live in country A their pension will be uprated, but if the choice is to live in country B their pension will not be uprated. In the final analysis, it is for the individual to weigh the benefits of living in country B, where her or his pension will not be uprated, against the benefits afforded by country A—or, indeed, remaining in the UK.

I am mindful that there are a number of hon. Members in the Chamber who wish to speak in the debate. It is a Backbench Business debate and I am mindful to give Back Benchers the freedom and opportunity to speak for a longer time than those on the Front Benches. So I congratulate again the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber, and those who have supported him, on securing the debate. I am very pleased to have been able to set out the Government’s position, which remains unchanged.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Blackford]

We have had a great debate and there is unity on both sides of the Chamber that the situation shames us all. Members on both sides of the House want the Government to take action. As many have said, it is about fairness. I thank the Front Benchers who have spoken, my hon. Friends the Members for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) and for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mhairi Black), and the hon. Members for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale), for Broxbourne (Mr Walker) and for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley).

This is a matter of considerable importance. The hon. Member for North Thanet has led the all-party parliamentary group with support from many others, including the hon. Member for Worthing West. We will not let this go, because we have a duty to stand up for the John Markhams of this world and all the others who have been mentioned.

I purposely did not mention the partial uprating but other hon. Members did. The Government could make a start by acknowledging the partial uprating. I say this to the Minister: please go away and talk to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who spoke in 2003 about the injustices taking place at that time. The Government should accept the moral responsibility that we have for pensioners everywhere. To take the logic of the hon. Member for Worthing West, if we as Members of Parliament decided to go and live in the British Virgin Islands, we would get our pension. If it is right for us, it is right for everybody else. Let’s do the right thing.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House notes with concern that the pensions of 550,000 UK pensioners residing in a number of overseas countries will no longer be uprated; is further concerned that this unfairness will lead to hardship for overseas pensioners and that this measure will discourage many UK citizens living in the UK from returning to their country of origin as many wish to do in their retirement; regrets that the Government has taken this action which will lead to loneliness and anger among UK pensioners living abroad; and calls on the Government to withdraw this measure and pay UK pensioners at home and abroad their due state pension with the same uprating adjustment in the interests of fairness and equity.

[Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I seek your urgent advice? I and others are very concerned about the plight of licensed black cab drivers in London, many of whom are my constituents—I believe many are your constituents. How can I bring my concerns best to the attention of the new Mayor of London?

Draft Automatic Enrolment (Earnings Trigger and Qualifying Earnings Band) Order 2016

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 16th March 2016 General Committees

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a considerable pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Mr Percy. I do not wish to detain the Committee for any longer than is necessary on what will be a busy day. The Scottish National party has an established position of supporting auto-enrolment as a principle, as the Minister knows, and I am happy not to divide the Committee this morning on the measure.

We have some concerns, however, about ensuring that auto-enrolment works to its fullest extent. There will be reforms in the years to come, and we are particularly concerned about part-time women workers who are under the threshold. It is important that we introduce the concept of saving and make sure that people can have dignity in retirement, and auto-enrolment is a route towards doing that.

The well-made comments that we have just heard bring home that there is far too much tinkering and changing, and a lack of certainty. Auto-enrolment should be the preferred route to go down. We can see from today’s Budget that there is a missed opportunity, in that we are not truly reforming pension tax relief to ensure that lower-paid workers get a fair bite of the cake.

However, I certainly commend the order to the Committee, and I look forward to seeing it strengthened in the period to come. Let us make sure that we have a savings culture that offers people security and dignity in their retirement.

Transitional State Pension Arrangements for Women

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

Having listened to the Minister for 35 minutes, I cannot think of a time when I have been in the Chamber and felt so utterly depressed by what I have heard— 35 minutes to say absolutely nothing and to give absolutely no hope to those women who are facing pension inequality. Talk about a Government who are out of touch!

The game was given away by one of the Minister’s hon. Friends, the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries), who told the Government that she is one of the ladies who are caught up in this. The Government know who she is, where she lives and her age, but she has heard nothing. Does the Minister have anything to say to her? Absolutely nothing—just sheer contempt from this Government for the WASPI women and the WASPI campaign. He and the Government should be utterly, utterly ashamed of themselves.

A Conservative MP asked me last night, “Why are we having yet another debate on this issue?”, and I have some sympathy with his view. We should not be having this debate for the simple and straightforward reason that the Government should have acted by now to end this injustice.

Let us just remind ourselves of the fundamentals. We in the Scottish National party, I am sure along with everybody else in this Chamber, agree with pension equalisation—we are not debating that—but we do not support the unfair manner in which the changes have been made. The Government must explore options for transitional arrangements to protect retirement plans for the females adversely affected. The Minister tossed out the figure of £30 billion, but what he did not say is that that is £30 billion over the years up to 2026. Let me give him one suggestion. The Government are consulting on pension tax relief, which costs a gross £35 billion. Why do they not readjust that to give some hope and to deal with the problem that women pensioners are facing?

[Richard Graham]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian Blackford]

I will give way later, but I want to make some progress because I am aware of the time constraints.

Parliament voted unanimously on 7 January for a motion that the Government should put into place mitigation for the women affected. The Prime Minister speaks about the sovereignty of this House. Why have the Government ignored that vote? Why have they ignored the will of the House? Whose sovereignty now? They cannot ignore the will of the House at random on the legitimate demands of the WASPI people. The Government are treating this House and the people of this country with contempt. Where is parliamentary democracy?

[Catherine McKinnell]

Does the hon. Gentleman share my concern that the Minister has, basically, confirmed from the Dispatch Box that this disgraceful discrimination is a price worth paying for deficit reduction?

[Ian Blackford]

The hon. Lady makes a very good point. The women in the WASPI campaign are paying for the failures of the economic policy of this Government.

Let me remind the House that what we have is a Conservative Government—

[Richard Graham]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. The hon. Gentleman did not give way earlier. I needed to correct him on a point of fact. The evidence given to the Work and Pensions—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Blackford]

I will indeed give way because I will treat this House with respect; respect that has not been shown to the WASPI women by this Government. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) is correct.

[Richard Graham]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian Blackford]

I will give way. I will answer the point and then give way.

Austerity is a political choice. In the election campaign, we argued that if the Government increased spending by 0.5% per annum in each year of the Parliament, they would increase spending by £140 billion but still reduce the deficit to 2% of net national income by the end of the Parliament. That is the responsible way. That would mean the Government would not be punishing the women who are affected by this. Show some leadership, Minister. Take some action and address this properly.

[Richard Graham]

The hon. Gentleman said earlier that the cost would be some £29 billion by 2026. He is completely wrong. The evidence to the Select Committee is that the bill in 2016-17 would be £29 billion and the total cost £77 billion. In Westminster Hall, the hon. Gentleman said that his party would commit to the policy of changing that if it were ever in the unlikely position of having responsibility for running these things itself. Will he confirm that his party leader will say, on the record, that if the SNP ever had responsibility for this, it would commit £77 billion?

[Ian Blackford]

Good grief! Have I ever heard such nonsense as I have just heard from the hon. Gentleman? I never committed the SNP to anything. What I did was make suggestions about what the Government may do. To toss around the £77 billion figure, which refers to the 1995 Act, is something I have never done. House of Commons Library figures show that the cost of reversing the 2011 Act would be £30 billion by 2026. Let us get the facts right. Rather than the nonsense from the Conservative Benches, we will tell the truth; they can spin the nonsense.

The Government keep telling us that this matter was decided in 2011 and we should just meekly accept that. What arrogance! I, and every other Member elected in May 2015, was sent to this place not to accept whatever went before. We were sent here to represent the views of our constituents in this Parliament. If we want to change the 2011 Act, we can do it. The Minister should stop hiding behind that. We cannot be bound by the mistakes of past Parliaments. We are here to speak up for our constituents, to hold the Government to account and to make sure they right this wrong. My heavens, the ways of this place are archaic! It is little wonder that people in Scotland see Westminster as out of touch and irrelevant.

Although the Government and the Minister are yet to repent, the pensions Minister in the previous Government, Steve Webb, admitted recently that the Government made a bad decision on state pension age rises. It is time not just for Steve Webb but for the Government to repent. When the Minister responsible for piloting the Bill through Parliament can see the error of his ways, surely the Treasury can recognise it has to act in the best interests of the women affected. When I think of the intransigence of the Treasury in not recognising its responsibility to do the right thing, I am reminded of a line that I am sure could be used in a school report card for the Chancellor of the Exchequer: we thought George had reached rock bottom; sadly, he has kept digging. This is one hole that the Government have to dig themselves out of. Many Conservative Members are hoping that this issue and the WASPI women are just going to go away. That is not going to happen. We will keep fighting for the WASPI women, because it is the right thing to do. The Chancellor has refused to act—the iron Chancellor in his bunker.

When we start to pay national insurance, we are entering a contract with the state to receive a pension. The Government have an obligation to meet that commitment. There has to be fairness and transparency, and that is what is lacking in this case. We are asking for the Government to put in place mitigation to reflect and recognise that the pace of the pension age increase is far too steep. It is a pity, in the week that they are welcoming the fiscal framework that would allow us to proceed with the Scotland Bill, that we are not seeing pensions provision come to Scotland. One thing is crystal clear: if we had powers over pensions in Scotland we would do the right thing for our pensioners.

[Graham Evans]

Will the hon. Gentleman confirm to the House whether the SNP is making a £26 billion spending commitment?

[Ian Blackford]

I never realised the Tories were so hard of hearing. I thought I made that quite clear in my earlier remarks, but I will do it again. We are asking for the Government to make clear what they will offer in mitigation for pensioners. I gave the example of the review of pension tax relief. If they can find the money for £176 billion for weapons of mass destruction, they can find the money to do the right thing for pensioners.

[John Glen]

I recognise the passion the hon. Gentleman is bringing to the debate, but I am very concerned that the WASPI campaigners will be misled and be unable to understand clearly what the SNP will commit to if it is to bring forward the amelioration it says is so necessary. If he and his party want to be taken seriously, it is incumbent upon them to have a clear, costed proposal to bring to the House today.

[Ian Blackford]

This is remarkable. The difference between our Government in Scotland and the Tory Government in London is that we have a Government who are popular and responsible. There is a very easy answer to this: give us the powers over pensions. Give us our independence and we will do the right thing for our people and rectify the wrong that has been done by the Conservative Government.

[Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab)]

Conservative Members keep talking about money. That is very important, but there is another issue—fairness. Maybe you do not know, but a third of the women between the age of 55 and 59 do not work. Do you know why they do not work? Because they have ill health or are disabled. The other half are either carers or looking after people. The reality is—

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[Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)]

The hon. Gentleman has been in and out of the Chamber. He was here at the beginning of the debate. May I use this opportunity to calm things a little bit, so we can move on? A very large number of Members want to speak. If Members make interventions, please keep them short. May I also remind Members that they are speaking through the Chair? When they say “you” they are addressing the Chair, not hon. Members.

[Ian Blackford]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I very much agree with the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis), who makes very good points. It is all about unfairness to women who are really struggling, women with ill health and women who cannot work; and it is about the Government accepting their responsibilities.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Ian Blackford]

I have already taken a lot of interventions and I am aware that many Members want to speak, so I shall try to get through my points as quickly as I can.

Let me deal with the real case of women born in the early 1950s. This is something I have said before, but it needs repetition. Let us talk about women born on 10 February and let us look at the different experiences as they apply to each of the years of the early 1950s. Someone born on 10 February 1950 would have retired at age 60 in 2010. Women born a year later, however, would have had to wait almost two years longer to have retired on 6 January 2012. A woman born on 10 February 1952 would have reached state pension age on 6 January 2014, aged 61 years, 10 months and 27 days. Such a woman has had to wait an additional two years in comparison with a woman born in 1950.

If that were not bad enough, the increase for women born in 1953 and 1954 gets much worse. Someone born in 1953 would have retired in January this year, aged nearly 63, whereas a woman born in 1954 will not reach pensionable age until 6 July 2019, when she will be aged 65 years, four months and 26 days. A woman born in 1954 has to wait two and a half years longer for their pension than someone born a year earlier. We should dwell on that point.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that as this plays out to the public, many women in the WASPI campaign who are watching our proceedings today, no doubt with huge disappointment, will be even more disappointed to see that the Tory Benches are populated almost exclusively by men, who are explaining why women born in the 1950s should not be able to access their pension? [Interruption.] I said “almost exclusively”. They are watching these detached, remote, middle-aged men explaining why they cannot access their pensions.

[Ian Blackford]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. We should all, whether we be men or women, reflect on the unfairness. It is an issue that we should see as simply wrong, and we should deal with it, whether we be male or female.

Let us dwell on the point. Someone born in 1953 has now retired, while someone born in 1954 has to wait until 2019. Where is the fairness in that? Let me ask Conservative Members who among them is going to defend it. I ask a Minister, a Back Bencher or any Conservative to rise to defend what the Government are doing. Why should some people have to wait so long?

[Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman seriously believe, given that my constituents in Blackpool North and Cleveleys want me to be here, that I should leave the Chamber and not participate in the debate because I am a man?

[Ian Blackford]

I am sorry to hear that approach taken by the hon. Gentleman. I was looking for someone to defend the Government. I provided the opportunity for a Conservative Member to do so, and the hon. Gentleman failed. Everyone in this Chamber has the right to defend the interests of their constituents—we would all support that.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Ian Blackford]

I want to make some progress.

We shall see whether the House divides on the motion later, but Tory Back Benchers may well meekly trot through the Lobbies and do nothing other than support the Government over an issue that is, in our view, completely untenable. This is a debate, so I ask Conservative Members whether they will defend the Government. I will happily give way to any Tory Member who is prepared to stand up for the WASPI women in this country.

[Nadine Dorries]

I point out that we would like to speak in the debate when the opening speeches are over.

[Ian Blackford]

To defend what the Government are doing is to defend the indefensible. It is wrong; it is mean-spirited. Conservative Members should not just troop through the Lobbies without reflecting on the situation of women who in some cases are losing tens of thousands of pounds of their entitlement.

I have talked so far about women born up to 1954. A woman born in 1955 will not retire until 10 February 2021, aged 66 years. That cannot be right. It is far too steep an increase over a short period, and the Government must put mitigation in place. You Government Members should examine your consciences. You will have women from the WASPI campaign coming to see you—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman is speaking through the Chair. When he says “you”, he is speaking to me, but I am not directly participating in the debate. I would be grateful if he would address his comments in the third person.

[Ian Blackford]

I apologise most sincerely for my oversight, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I will make sure it does not happen again.

Conservative Members will have women from the WASPI campaign coming to their surgeries. Let us look at what some of the woman affected have said about their real- life experiences of these changes. Here is one example:

“My husband and I got married in 1974, he is 12 years older than me. I like to think we planned life in the right way. The pension law has put all our plans out the window. I had been planning all my available options, when my husband retired, and in 2011, I requested my state pension forecast. It stated that if I deferred till 2020 I should receive a £14,621 lump sum. I thought this may allow me the option to work two days and still enjoy my family, but thanks to the changes I will no longer receive this. Also, I hadn’t anticipated that my age might make me a prime candidate for redundancy. Losing my job in 2014, was a massive blow. The government may have changed the law, but it turns out many industries don’t want 60+ women. They are effectively retiring us, and forcing us to use our lifetime savings on daily living costs, as no one wants to hire us!”

There are so many points to dwell on there, but most importantly, it speaks of the crushing of so many hopes and dreams.

It is also the case that many women are being forced to work on beyond their expected retirement date, and this brings its own challenges in terms of the availability of suitable employment, and many are sadly experiencing ill health. What has been the response of the Government? It is that other benefits are available. What a response! You have worked hard, paid your dues to society, met your side of the bargain in paying national insurance and expected to receive a pension, yet this callous, heartless Government are ripping that contract up and telling folk to claim benefits. Is that really the answer? You can get means-tested benefits, which will cost the Exchequer, but you are being denied what is rightfully yours. Welcome to “Osborne’s Britain”—callous, cold and undignified.

[Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)]

Is not the crux of the issue that we see a clear breach of contract? If this were a private pension company that unilaterally changed the pension conditions of 2.6 million ladies in this country, this House would quite rightly be up in arms. Those ladies want only to have that contract mitigated fairly. Surely the Government should listen to the 2.6 million ladies in this country, and act now.

[Ian Blackford]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes a very good point. We were talking earlier about the Financial Conduct Authority and consumer protection, yet here are consumers being ripped off by their own Government, who are ripping up entitlements to the state pension. Conservative Members should be up in arms over this; they should defend the rights of their constituents.

Let me provide just one other example, as I am conscious of the time. Here it is:

“My husband will be 78 by the time I can retire. I had been looking forward to slowing down at 60 and enjoying putting my family, husband, children and grandchildren at the centre of my life. In Cameron’s speech on why families matter in 2014 he stated that he wanted to do ‘everything possible to help support and strengthen family life in Britain today’. Had I been available for my grandchildren, my daughter and her husband would not have had to pay £1700 a month for her two children to go to nursery, putting them in debt. They are both teachers and could not manage their mortgage on one salary. As you can see the changes to the state pension have not supported or strengthened our family, the changes have left us in a state of disarray”—

all thanks to this Conservative Government. That is the reality.

As I sum up—[Interruption.] Well, I could quite happily go on! What are Conservative MPs going to say to women who are going to have to wait six years longer than anticipated for their pension? This is a breach of trust between the Government and the women who have earned the right to a pension. We should recall the advice from the Turner report that such measures should be brought in over a 15-year period to mitigate the impact of any such changes.

We have heard about the failure of communication, which it could be argued means that the start of the 15-year process should be the beginning of the changes in 2010. That means there will effectively be a retirement age of 63 for women as of April this year. The Government could, for example, look at smoothing the increase in pensionable age for women to 2025. The Government should do the right thing and immediately introduce mitigation. Now is the time to act; if not, we will be coming back to this place and fighting for the women who deserve our protection.

--- Later in debate ---

[Justin Tomlinson]

Because of the lack of time, I will not give way.

We have to look at the acceleration of state pension age equalisation, which is being introduced by this Government in order to achieve gender equality in state pension provision and to provide a sustainable system that can work for future generations. Often that is forgotten. It is always about now, not those future generations, our children and our children’s children, to whom all too often politicians have bequeathed yet more debt.

In recent years, because of higher life expectancy and the difference in state pension ages, women on average have been receiving considerably more state pension over their lifetime than men. Not only was equalisation necessary to meet the UK’s obligations under EU law, but it provides the foundations for a fairer state pension that treats men and women equally.

[Ian Blackford]

Will the Minister give way?

[Justin Tomlinson]

I apologise to those who want to intervene. Those who debated with me in Westminster Hall know that I will always try to answer as many questions and interventions as possible. We simply do not have time today.

Equalisation provides the foundations for a fairer state pension that treats men and women equally. That is something we can all agree on, on both sides of the House. The changes to state pension age were fully considered when the 2011 Act was passed. The Government listened to concerns at the time and adopted a concession worth over £1 billion, which benefited almost a quarter of a million women. Eighty-one per cent. of women affected will experience a delay of 12 months or less, compared with the previously legislated timetable.

The Government are also committed to helping older workers stay in the labour market and have extended the right of flexible working to all employees to help achieve this. We are now seeing record numbers of women in employment—over 1 million more since 2010. With the introduction of the national living wage, over two thirds of those who will directly benefit will be women. That is something we can all be proud of. For those who are having difficulties working, the Government provide the same support for women as for men of the same age—in work, out of work, and disability benefits.

I also appreciate the comments made about Government communication. My hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale made great play of this. All Governments of all political colours have always wrestled with the question of the best way to communicate. The DWP did write directly to all the individuals affected by the 2011 Act using the address details recorded by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs at the time. More than 5 million letters were sent at the time. A service has also been available for individuals to request their state pension estimates, and this service has been providing individuals with their state pension age since 1995. We have taken these lessons on board with the auto-enrolment scheme, with which we are seeing very successful engagement.

We must view these changes as part of the wider pension reforms. Those reaching state pension age from April of this year onwards will receive the new state pension, a reformed system that particularly benefits women who would have had poor outcomes under the current system. Over 3 million women stand to gain an average of £11 per week as a result of the changes by 2030.

In conclusion, I remind the House of the reasons for the reform of our state pension system. To function effectively, it has to be fair, affordable and sustainable. These changes made to the state pension age under the Pensions Act 2011 make an important contribution to achieving these aims.

Question put.

Transitional State Pension Arrangements for Women

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Monday 1st February 2016 Westminster Hall

[Richard Graham]

May I make a little progress before giving way to the hon. Lady?

First, I agree that the changes in the Pensions Act 1995 and the Pensions Act 2011 will undoubtedly be difficult for women born in the 1950s. Indeed, those changes have been underway for some time and the pension age for women is already 63. But—this is a significant but, and a challenge that has to be made today—I do not accept the proposed WASPI solution, and I will explain why.

The e-petition states:

“The Government must make fair transitional arrangements for all women born on or after 6th April 1951 who have unfairly borne the burden of the increase to the State Pension Age”.

The fair, transitional arrangement sought by the campaign is spelt out on the WASPI Facebook page, which reads:

“What is our ask?... put all women born in the 50s, or after 6th April 1951 and affected by the changes to the state pension age in the same financial position they would have been in had they been born on or before 5th April 1950.”

One of the key WASPI campaigners, Anne Keen, who I imagine is here today, said in her evidence to the Women and Equalities Committee,

“we feel this is a very fair ask”.

Now, the impact of the ask that appears on the WASPI Facebook page has been estimated at more than £30 billion. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us a little bit more clarity on that. The figure is a third more than the entire Transport budget, more than the entire budget of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and probably the same as—possibly more than—the entire budget for Scotland. What we are talking about today may be considered a very fair ask by some people, but others may consider it an enormous and wholly inappropriate ask.

The petition states that the WASPI campaign agrees with equalisation, but the implication of the ask on the Facebook page, and as repeated to the Women and Equalities Committee, is to unwind the 1995 Act, which was brought in specifically to bring about the equality of gender.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

rose—

[Richard Graham]

If the spokesman for the Scottish National party wishes me to give way, I am happy to do so.

[Ian Blackford]

We recognise that equalisation has to take place, but this is about the pace of change and the desire to ensure that mitigation can take place. We talked about the pension age being 63. As it is, somebody born in February 1954 will not retire until July 2019—two and a half years after somebody born a year earlier. That cannot be acceptable. Also, £30-odd billion is not the spending in one year; it is the spending up to 2026. The hon. Gentleman should get his facts right.

[Richard Graham]

I am half grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. The SNP’s position has always been interesting, because its Members are in the happy situation of being able to say—and, if need be, to promise—whatever they like without any danger of having to fulfil a commitment on the pension age. I notice that he did not try to commit himself to any transitional arrangement, let alone the full transitional arrangement proposed by the WASPI campaign. It is fine for hon. Members to posture in this debate, and I am in no doubt that we will see a great deal of that, but it is unkind and unfair to the WASPI campaigners for Members not to speak honestly about what they and their party would do.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ben Howlett]

I want to try to make some progress. I note the time, and I do not want to go on for too long.

There is a legal obligation here, and also a European Union directive on gender discrimination, with several EU members already having equalised the state pension age. One of those is Germany, the birthplace of the state pension. I am, therefore, supportive of the Government’s state pension changes but, as a member of the Women and Equalities Committee, I think there is a case for transitional arrangements for the most vulnerable. However, that must be balanced against the implications for our yet-to-be-eradicated deficit. Even the most minimal of mitigations would come at a significant financial cost; just paying the state pension for an extra 12 months to the women affected would cost £2.2 billion, and that is aside from the further complications that would be caused to the system. However, I must note the concerns I have heard about the changes, and I know that the Department for Work and Pensions continues to deny that the women affected were not contacted.

[Ian Blackford]

Does the hon. Gentleman not understand that a contract exists, in effect, between the affected women and the Government? If someone was paying into a private pension and the rules were changed at the last minute, my heavens the matter would end up in court. This is not about the Government’s deficit; it is about doing the right thing, and about a commitment that the Government have to women of a certain age.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson. I thank the Petitions Committee, of which I am delighted to be a member, for allowing this debate on the back of the petition from the WASPI women. They have been a credit to themselves in the way they have campaigned on this issue, and I hope that they will continue to campaign in the days, weeks and months to come. We must win this debate, and there has to be action.

I thank the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) for introducing this debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee. I am unable to go through everyone’s speeches because of time, but I thank all Members who have spoken passionately about the injustices faced by millions of women in this country because of the speed of the changes.

[Peter Grant]

Some pejorative and patronising comments have been made about the degree of emotion that the debate has aroused. Does my hon. Friend agree that men can get emotional about social injustice as well and that we should see that as a sign not of weakness, but of common humanity?

[Ian Blackford]

There should be emotion in this debate. Why? Because women are losing tens of thousands of pounds that they are entitled to. Of course people should be emotional. There are facts that the Government have to address and they should do so in a measured and controlled manner.

The hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) said that the point about communications had been noted. Nobody is asking the Government to note the failures in communication; we are asking the Government to act on the basis of the failure of communication and to right the wrong that has been done.

I was grateful to hear the words of the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann). He spoke honestly about not being aware of the issue. Is that not exactly the point? A Member of Parliament has not been aware of these issues, so how can we expect the women affected by the changes to be aware of them? That is yet another reason why we must act.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Ms Ahmed-Sheikh) spoke about the goalposts being moved. She is exactly right. There is a contract between the state and the women. This is not, as my hon. Friend said, about benefits they should be entitled to. It is about an entitlement based on the fact that these women have paid national insurance in some cases for 30, 40 or even more years. It is a breach of trust, as the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) said. The Government should reflect on what has been said and on the tone of the debate.

The Minister spoke about this matter in the Chamber this afternoon, saying:

“A whole lot of other benefits are available to the women who may be affected—for example, jobseeker’s allowance, employment and support allowance, income support, carer’s allowance and personal independence payment.”

Does that not explain the problem that the Government do not get this? They want women to go to the jobcentre, rather than to do what they should be doing by collecting a pension to which they are entitled.

What is parliamentary democracy in this country? On 7 January we had an excellent, well informed debate in the Chamber. The House divided and voted 158 to zero that the Government should put in place mitigation efforts. Weeks have passed and nothing has happened. When will the Government respect the will of this House? It is a shame that there is no mechanism by which to put the issue to a vote today, as I am sure that hon. Members want to ensure that it is put to a vote so that the House can express its will.

Speaker after speaker has condemned the Government for not doing the right thing. The way of this place is archaic. It is little wonder that folksy Westminster is out of touch. I contrast the behaviour of this Government in this attack on women born in the 1950s, and in so many other ways, with what our Government in Scotland do. Last week the Government in London were defeated in the courts over the bedroom tax. Was there any recognition that what they were doing was wrong? In Scotland, we have mitigated the effects of the bedroom tax and we want powers to remove it. One thing is crystal clear: if we had powers over pensions in Scotland, we would do the right thing for our pensioners. This Government plough on regardless, ignoring the justified claims of the WASPI women. I state once again, as many of my colleagues have, that we are not against equalisation. We support the move to equalisation, but the pace of the move is unfair.

Look at the reality of what is happening. We can take examples of women born across the early years of the 1950s, whose experiences will be sharply different. A woman born on 10 February 1950 would have retired aged 60 in 2010, whereas a woman born later would have to wait almost two years longer to retire on 6 January 2012. A woman born on 10 February 1952 would have reached state pension age a few weeks ago aged 61 years, 10 months and 27 days. Such a woman will have had to wait almost two additional years more than a woman born in 1950.

As if that were not bad enough, the increase for women born in 1953 and 1954 is worse. A woman born on 10 February in 1953 would have retired in January this year, aged nearly 63. A woman born on 10 February in 1954 will not reach pensionable age until 6 July 2019, when she will be aged 65 years, four months and 26 days. That is shameful—a woman born in 1954 will have to wait two and a half years longer for her pension than a woman born in 1953.

Just dwell on that: someone born on 10 February 1953 has now retired; someone born a year later must wait until July 2019. Where is the fairness in that? If the Minister wants to intervene, I will give him the opportunity to say now that the Government are listening and are going to change. Does any Conservative Back Bencher want to rise to their feet to recognise the unfairness of it? Do they want to punish women in the way they are doing, or will they accept that it is wrong? Here is the opportunity. They can rise to their feet.

[Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con)]

I am happy to rise. I regret that the hon. Gentleman, in an impassioned speech in which he has done good justice to past inequalities suffered by women, has chosen to drag this issue into a political arena, because—[Hon. Members: “This is Parliament!”] A party political arena, I should say. There are Members from all parties who support the cause of the women fighting for greater equality, and women themselves, of all political persuasions and none, will be disadvantaged by the changes. He spoke just moments ago—

[Mr David Hanson (in the Chair)]

Order. Interventions must be short. Time is very limited, and I have to give the Opposition Front-Bench spokesperson and the Minister time to finish before 7.30.

[Ian Blackford]

I say to the hon. Lady and her colleagues that they should join us in the Lobby and vote down the Government proposals. We need change. The Tory Back Benchers need to get some backbone and recognise the problems faced by women in their constituencies. I say to them, you hold your Government to account, and we will get on and do our job by holding them to account.

I ask Conservative Members: who will defend the proposals? Let the Minister say that he now recognises that they are wrong and must change. I have not even got to women born in 1955, who will not retire until February 2021, aged 66 years. It cannot be right. It is too steep an increase over so short a period. I ask Conservative Members to examine their consciences. Women from the WASPI campaign will be coming to their surgeries. Some of them will have been born in 1955 and were expecting to retire now or at least not long in the future. Are Conservative Members going to tell them that it is right that they must wait six years longer than someone born five years earlier, without mitigation? That is where we are at the moment.

It has been said that this is a breach of trust between the Government and women who have earned the right to a pension. In the limited time left to me, I will talk about proposals, because we were asked about them. Turner talked about taking 15 years to introduce the changes. The changes effectively started in 2010. The Government could look to moderate the increase from age 63 to age 66 over the next 10 years. That would mitigate the pressure that women are under. It is about doing the right thing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

In only a decade, the time that 65-year-olds live in good health has gone up by just over a year. Of course, this is welcome news, but the reality is that it puts increasing pressure on the state pension scheme. Even when the state pension age changes are taken into account, women in this group will on average receive a higher state pension over their lifetime than any generation before them.

[Ian Blackford]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Vara]

I will not give way.

The Government have a duty to ensure the sustainability of the state pension scheme, and it would be irresponsible to ignore such developments.

Employment prospects for women have changed dramatically since the state pension age was first set in 1940. The most recent figures show a record female employment rate of 69.1%, with more than 1 million more women in work than in 2010. I am sure that Members welcome figures showing that the number of women aged between 50 and 64 in work is also at a record high, with more than 100,000 older women in work than at this time last year.

[Mr Vara]

I will not.

Turning to our broader reforms, we have introduced a package of measures to transform the pensions system. The triple lock is massively boosting the state pension, which will be £1,000 higher from April than would have been the case if we had uprated by earnings over the past six years. In addition, we have protected the winter fuel payment and permanently increased cold weather payments. We have created a new, simpler state pension, which will come in from April with a full rate of £155.65 a week. That means that 650,000 women will receive an average increase of £8 a week for the first 10 years. As that will be set above the basic means test for pensioners, people will have a clear platform to save on.

[Ian Blackford]

On a point of order, Mr Hanson. May I ask for your guidance about what can be done? This is a specific debate about the WASPI campaign, but the points that the Minister is addressing have nothing to do with that debate—

[Mr David Hanson (in the Chair)]

Order. With due respect to the hon. Gentleman, the content of the Minister’s speech is for the Minister to elucidate and defend accordingly. It is not for the hon. Gentleman to comment on in a point of order.

Draft Pensions Act 2014 (Consequential and Supplementary Amendments) Order 2016 Draft State Pension and Occupational Pension Schemes (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2016

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2016 General Committees

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure, Ms Buck, to serve under your chairmanship. The changes to the rules on derived and inherited rights are a complex part of the reform package. In its evidence to the inquiry by the Work and Pensions Committee aimed at understanding the state pension, Age UK called on the Government to ensure that those who could be worse off due to the reforms are a priority for communications. As been referred to, communications have been a big issue in many pension matters in the past few years. A priority for communications should be to reach groups who may have planned their retirement income based on the current system but could be worse off due to the reforms. Particularly for women, the loss of derived and inherited rights to the basic pension could reduce entitlement. In the most extreme situation, a woman who is widowed with no entitlement in her own right could end up with no state pension, compared with an expected £115.95 under the current system.

Most women will have made some contributions in their own right, so they will not lose that much, but they could still receive significantly less than they expected. Couples in that situation need to be made aware of the changes so they can review their retirement plans. The Department for Work and Pensions said that as part of its communication activity, it is targeting specific groups such as the self-employed and those with low qualifying years, who may be at risk of failing the minimum qualifying period, as well as those impacted by the changes to the derived entitlement and inheritance rules. The experience of communication regarding the increase in the state pension age suggests that it is reasonable to question whether the Department should not go further and, as recommended by Age UK, directly contact individuals with gaps in their national insurance record.

Like the Labour spokesperson, we remain concerned over the whole WASPI—women against state pensions inequality—issue. There was a debate a number of weeks ago in the Chamber, when the House divided and expressed its opinion clearly by 158 votes to zero. What is parliamentary democracy if the Government feel they can ignore the will of the House? Finally, on frozen pensions, we remain concerned that those who have an entitlement to a UK pension are being denied their full rights. If we do not get sufficient answers this afternoon, the Scottish National party will oppose these measures.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

I do not think anyone in the Committee would expect me to give precise numbers about how many emails have been sent out by a specific Department. If I may remind the hon. Gentleman, his original question was what are the forms of communication. That is the question I answered. If he now wishes to change the question and say he wants specific numbers, because he is not happy with the answer I gave, I think the Committee will be sympathetic to the response that I cannot give the precise number of emails that have been sent out.

[Ian Blackford]

This is a massively important point. Anyone who is involved in an occupational pension scheme or any other type of scheme, will be used to getting annual letters telling them exactly what their entitlements are. Given the importance of this, the Government must communicate with all potential pensioners in a fair and reasonable manner. That means that the DWP has a duty to inform such people by letter—that would be the established practice. I cannot for the life of me understand why the Minister is hiding behind data protection. The Government have a duty to make sure that people prepare adequately for their pension. The Government must take that responsibility and communicate effectively.

[Mr Vara]

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

There is no one specific form of communication that my Department will be looking at. We recognise the various forms of communication that exist in the modern world and we will seek to use some of those as we feel they will best target the relevant people. I take on board what the hon. Gentleman says, but it is important to recognise that there is no single form of communication that we use. We recognise that in the modern world there are various forms and communicate accordingly.

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Mr Vara]

I have given the hon. Gentleman plenty of opportunities. I will give way once more, but I think this point has been laboured somewhat.

[Ian Blackford]

This is a massively important point. We all understand that social media is a wonderful tool—the Minister has referred to what was done in the election campaign and so on—but we are talking about the fundamental right that people have to a pension. People have paid national insurance; they deserve to be told by DWP what they are going to get. That is not a message to be delivered by social media, it is a message that should be delivered by letter. That is the right thing to do, and the Government must do it.

[Mr Vara]

May I put on record, since we are talking about how my Department ensures that people know about the changes, as well as all the items I have just mentioned, the “Know the Facts” communication campaign focused on building awareness for those aged 55-plus, who will be the first to reach state pension age after the new state pension is introduced? That campaign encouraged people to get a personalised statement. Between September 2014 and October 2015, nearly half a million statements were issued. In the current phase of the campaign we are looking at specific groups who may need more detailed information, including people who have been contracted out, have been self-employed, may have a low number of qualifying years, or may be affected by changes to the rules on deriving an inherited state pension.

A range of products is available to help people understand the impact of the changes. These include factsheets, infographics, videos, calculators and content for PensionTube, a YouTube channel dedicated to pensions. The campaign advertising also encourages people to engage with material online, and there is a range of supporting materials on www.gov.uk. We have in place extensive stakeholder communications with third-party organisations and have held stakeholder forums, produced a toolkit for stakeholders and continue to issue weekly stakeholder bulletins. We do communicate with the relevant people outside, we will continue to do so, and we will continue to make sure that people are appreciative of the message. I commend the regulations and the order to the Committee.

Question put.

State Pension Age (Women)

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

I warmly thank my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mhairi Black) and congratulate her on securing the debate, and on making such a powerful speech about the inequalities that many women face as a result of changes in the state pension regime. I must add that, given that the debate concerns an issue that is so important to millions of women, it is an utter disgrace that a grand total of two Tory Back Benchers were in the Chamber at 2 pm, and that only half a dozen are present now, as the debate draws to a close. That shows the contempt that the Government feel for the women who are suffering as a result of the pension changes that have been foisted on them. [Interruption.] Yes, it would have been easier for them just to turn up. Where are they, and will they have the guts to stand up and vote this afternoon if we press the motion to a Division, as I expect we will?

There is no more fundamental consideration for all of us than ensuring that we can look forward to retirement, and to a retirement that offers security and dignity. We are here today because women who were born in the 1950s believe that they have been short-changed by this Government, and they are right to do so.

I should make it clear—as many of my hon. Friends have done already, along with Labour Members—that we support the principle of equalisation. It is not equalisation that is the issue; it is the speed of the journey towards equalisation that is unjust, and has led to significant and unacceptable consequences for many women whose expectation of retirement has been deferred.

The Government will tell us, as they often do, that this is all about money. To us, it is also about equity and fairness, and about doing the right thing. That is the problem with this Government. They are wedded to austerity, and wedded to reducing spending, and their obligation to society—and, specifically, to the case that women pensioners are pressing—is one that they are quite prepared to rip up and toss away: “Let us get the deficit down, and others will have to pay the price.” Austerity is not an economic necessity but a political choice, and 1950s women are paying the price of that choice. As we know, this Government know the price of everything and the value of nothing. Women’s pension rights are expendable, and the hopes of many for a decent retirement are crushed by the desire to achieve a budget surplus. We should never cease to tell the House, and the country, that there is an alternative. What we are seeing from the Government is an abrogation of responsibility. We are seeing a poverty of hope and a poverty of ambition.

No doubt the Minister will trot out the excuse that the money could not be found to create a longer transitional period, but this is all about priorities. When a Government can find £167 billion to invest in weapons of mass destruction, they can find the money to ensure that our prisoners are protected. On this issue as on so many others, this Government have a faulty moral compass.

When people enter into an arrangement with any pension provider, they are, in effect, assuming that the provider will exercise its contractual responsibilities. Whether private pensions or national insurance contributions are involved, they are effectively entering into a contractual arrangement. In this case, the state had, since 1940, been paying pensions to women who had reached the age of 60. Women had the expectation that that was what was going to happen.

The women behind the WASPI campaign are to be congratulated on the way in which they have pursued this matter. As with the issue of tax credits, on which the Government ultimately had to see sense, I expect there to be a growing clamour for the Government to do the right thing. I am glad to see that the press are already beginning to take an interest in this story. The Sunday Post in Scotland should be commended for putting it on the front page last Sunday. I understand from its Westminster editor that it has received nearly 400 e-mails this week from women affected by the changes, and I have many of them here.

Let us look at the reality of what is happening. Let us consider how sharply different will be the experiences of women born in the early 1950s. For argument’s sake, let us take the examples of women who were born on 10 February, from 1950 onwards. A woman who was born on 10 February 1950 would have retired at 60 in 2010. A woman born a year later would have had to wait almost two years longer to retire on 6 January 2012. A woman born on 10 February 1952 would have reached the state pension age yesterday, aged 61 years, 10 months and 27 days. Such a woman would have had to wait almost two more years than a woman born in 1950. As if that were not bad enough, the increases in pensionable age for women born in 1953 and 1954 become markedly worse. A woman born in 1954 will not reach pensionable age until 6 July 2019, when she will be aged 65 years, four months and 26 days. A woman born in 1955 will not retire until 10 February 2021, aged 66.

That cannot be right. It is far too steep an increase in pensionable age over a short period. I ask the few Conservative Members who are present to examine their consciences. Members of the WASPI campaign will be coming to their surgeries. Perhaps they will include a woman who was born in 1955, and who had expected to retire either now or not long into the future. Are Conservative MPs going to tell those women that it is right for them to have to wait six years longer than someone who was born five years earlier, without mitigation? That is the scale of the increase that has hit them. It is a breach of trust between the Government and women who have earned the right to a pension. Let me, as a reasonable person—as indeed we all are on these SNP Benches—help the Government out. We should also heed the recognition of the last Pensions Minister, Steve Webb, who last month admitted that the Government made a bad decision on state pension age rises. We should recall the advice from the Turner report—much quoted today—that such measures should be brought in over a 15-year period to mitigate the impact of any such changes. We have heard about the failure of communication, which it can be argued means the start of the 15-year process should be the beginning of the changes in 2010. That would mean that, as we are effectively going to be at a retirement age of 63 for women as of April this year, the Government could, for example, look at smoothing the increase in pensionable age for women aged 63 to 66 out to 2025.

My hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South mentioned at the start of her speech that pensions are incredibly complicated. My hon. Friend is also right that we have built in complexity, as well as a number of inconsistencies from the incessant tinkering that often seems at odds with other aspects of pension policy. We all ought to agree that pensions policy should be about getting things right for the longer term.

A number of positive developments have been enacted, such as auto-enrolment, but even here we need to come back and talk about how we can enhance auto-enrolment, and deal with the issue of part-time workers, for example. There are also outstanding issues on the new single-tier pension, and here again there are rightful criticisms of how this has affected many woman born in the 1950s. What I would suggest to the Government, and this is something I hope would have broad support, is that they should establish an independent pension commission that can look holistically at all these issues that require oversight.

If we accept, as we do, that there has to be equalisation of the state pension age, we also need to look at how this and the increase in the state pension age will affect people throughout the UK. We need to look at vastly different mortality rates across the UK and question how this may influence the debate on state pension age.

In conclusion, therefore, let me say the following. In Scotland a 65-year-old man today can normally expect to live until he is 82, and a woman to age 84. That is nearly two and a half years below life expectancy in England. There is therefore a considerable difference in the life experiences of people in different parts of the UK and, crucially, much less time for someone in Scotland to enjoy a secure and comfortable retirement.

We have had a debate today that has shone a light on pension inequalities that many woman born in the 1950s face. I hope the Government are listening and are prepared to reflect on what can be done to mitigate this unfairness. I would also hope they would take on board our suggestion of having an independent pension commission.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

The hon. Lady should respect the views of other people, rather than simply stating that what she says is right. We are bound by EU law, but it is also right and proper that we should have gender equality, irrespective of EU law.

[Ian Blackford]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Vara]

I will not give way. I am mindful of the limited time that I have, and I am keen to ensure that the proposer of the motion, the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South, has time to make her concluding comments at the end of the debate.

The introduction of the new state pension will benefit many women who would have lost out under the current two-tier system, largely as a result of lower average earnings and part-time working. All those affected by the 2011 changes will reach pension age after the introduction of the new state pension. Around 650,000 women reaching state pension age in the first 10 years will receive an average of £8 per week more under the new state pension than they would have done under the previous system. The majority of households reaching state pension age up to 2030 will receive a higher total income over retirement under the new system.

The solution to ensuring that people have a comfortable later life is encouraging and enabling them to work longer. This benefits individuals through the social and financial rewards of employment, it benefits employers through the skills and experiences that older workers bring to the workplace, and it benefits the wider economy. Research by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research has shown that adding just one year to people’s working lives would add 1% to UK GDP per year.

Support is in place to provide extra help for people who cannot work owing to caring responsibilities, ill health or disability. Women affected would be eligible for the same in-work, out-of-work or disability benefits as men of their age, and carer’s allowance may be available, for which national insurance credits are awarded automatically. In 2011, credits were introduced to help adult family members looking after a child under 12 in order to assist the parents who were working, with these credits being able to count towards state pension entitlements.

Much has been made of the comments made by the previous Pensions Minister, Steve Webb, and it is important to recognise that even he was not seeking a restoration that would cost £30 billion. Indeed, he said that he was only looking for a 10% clawback. It is also worth remembering that he does recognise that the £1.1 billion concession that was made was generous. His exact words were:

“and we got £1 billion back in the end, and a billion quid is a serious amount of money.”

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Mr Vara]

I will not give way.

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[Mr Vara]

Much has been made of what was “promised” on Second Reading. What I say to the hon. Lady and others is that this concession was made after it was said that this would be considered, and that the concession is worth six months and £1.1 billion.

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Mr Vara]

I have only a short time left and I must press on.

As for people being aware of the 1995 changes, I should add that research carried out in 2004 by the Department for Work and Pensions found that 73% of people aged 45 to 54 were aware of the changes to women’s state pension age. It is regrettable that people have sought to put this on a political basis and have conveniently forgotten that after 1995 we had 13 years of Labour government. I have here a list of some 10 Labour Pensions Ministers who totally failed to do anything, yet Labour Members conveniently seek to put the blame on the things that have happened post-2010. The shadow Home Secretary made comments earlier, but he was a Labour Cabinet Minister, and the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), who also made comments today, was also in the Labour Administration. He is a former Pensions Minister, yet he did nothing then.

Welfare Cap

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

In the spirit of the season, let me congratulate Tory Front Benchers on recognising the futility of having passed legislation a year ago and now agreeing with the SNP’s position that the benefits cap was wrong.

The breach of the welfare cap prompts the question of what is the point of it if it can be exceeded within its first year. I remind the House that in 2014 the Chancellor of the Exchequer said:

“The welfare cap brings responsibility, accountability and fairness…From now on, any Government who want to spend more on welfare will have to be honest with the public—honest about the costs—and secure the approval of Parliament in order to breach the cap.”—[Official Report, 26 March 2014; Vol. 578, c. 381.]

He will have to eat his own words. To save his blushes, he should abandon this inflexible, unworkable, draconian policy and focus on tackling the root causes of welfare dependency at source.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman knows full well that this is an example of the cap working. The Government have had to explain why they have had to do this, and explain the context of the changes announced in the autumn statement. That is absolutely right and proper, and he should support the Government.

[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. Of course we will support the Government tonight, but the fact remains that we should not be having this debate because the cap should not have existed in the first place.

We have to recognise that social security protects the poorest and the vulnerable in our society, but we do not do that through these false measures, which is exactly what this is.

[Alberto Costa (South Leicestershire) (Con)]

In his festive mood, the hon. Gentleman has perhaps forgotten what the good people of Scotland said earlier this year, so it is worth reminding him. A Survation poll in Scotland said that a majority of its people, just like those in my constituency and across the UK, support efforts to reduce the cost of welfare, so are not he and his party out of touch with the people of Scotland?

[Ian Blackford]

I am truly grateful to the hon. Gentleman for asking that question. Of course the Scottish National party wants to reduce the cost of welfare, but we will do that by fixing the economy, driving up productivity and creating jobs. What we should not do is punish people. While we are on the subject of the election, let me take this opportunity to remind the House that we won 56 of the 59 seats in Scotland, and we did that while standing on a platform of investing in our communities and in job creation, making sure that we did not punish people with a failed austerity programme, and arguing for investment of an additional £140 billion throughout the whole of the UK over the next five years. That responsible position would have led to the financial deficit coming down to 2% of net national income by the end of this Parliament. The people of Scotland were very happy to support that much more responsible approach, and I commend it to this House.

Although we welcome today’s decision to breach the cap, it is apparent that the Chancellor cannot even stick to his own targets. When will this Conservative Government realise that the inflexibility of the welfare cap is unworkable and that the fact that they will breach the cap illustrates the need to abandon the policy?

We are calling on the Chancellor to abandon the cap and instead to focus on welfare dependency by tackling the structural drivers of higher welfare spending, such as rising rents, low pay and worklessness, as well as the barriers to work. That is a much more progressive way of dealing with the problems we face in the United Kingdom. We agree that it is sensible to control welfare spending, but the Government are simply not doing that with their continued focus on the austerity agenda. The welfare cap is simply not the correct approach.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer has chosen not to be here today. I am grateful to the Minister for speaking earlier, but he is here, cap in hand, to seek our support for the Government breaching their own rules and missing yet another target.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, given that the Chancellor is absent and the Work and Pensions Secretary was late, perhaps they ought to be sanctioned?

[Ian Blackford]

Indeed. Perhaps Opposition Members could handle the appeal—let us see how they would get on in such circumstances. I have some sympathy for the Minister, though, because it is the Chancellor of the Exchequer who ought to be answerable to the House on this issue.

Of course, the Chancellor has form when it comes to missing targets. Let us remind ourselves that the Government have spectacularly missed their targets for the budget deficit and for net debt. We were supposed to be in the black by now, but with growth and tax receipts in particular consistently coming in below target, the deficit and debt have remained above target. We must pose the question: when will the Government learn that their false optimism has a price, and that price is the cuts to budgets as they seek to balance the books?

On the autumn statement, the Office for Budget Responsibility managed to magic up an additional £27 billion of forecast revenues—talk about a sleight of hand to dig the Chancellor out of another hole of his own making. We know that the OBR has a history of over-estimating tax receipts. The respected Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said of the Chancellor’s plans:

“If he is unlucky—and that’s almost a 50-50 shot—he will have either to revisit these spending decisions, raise taxes, or abandon the surplus target.”

Talk about having form. If I may use some football terminology, I would not want the Chancellor to take a last-minute penalty for my team in a cup final—he would only miss the target. Own goals are much more the Chancellor’s speciality.

Why am I raising these matters? It is because social security spending is linked to the failure to deliver a robust economy, drive up tax receipts and limit the need for the safety net that social security provides. That is why the welfare cap is wrong: it does not deal with the cause of, or the need for, welfare.

The disastrous policy—made in No. 11 Downing Street—of punishing millions of hard-working families by reducing tax credits and thereby dramatically cutting the income of lower-paid workers has, thankfully, been reversed. If the benefit cap is breached as a consequence of sense prevailing, we should be grateful. We are mindful, however, of the fact that although the vindictive impact of the tax credit cuts has been avoided, there will be pain in years to come because the Government are still wedded to reducing the social security budget by £12 billion, with universal credit bearing the brunt.

We are not fooled by the Chancellor’s words that this is a reversal of the Tory ideological assault on the most disadvantaged. He announced that he would, in effect, spend £3.4 billion in 2016-17 to reverse the changes to the threshold and the taper rate, but it is important to note that the planned reductions in tax credits for families with more than two children will still apply. Ian Mulheirn of Oxford Economics said that

“this may be a U-turn in April 2016, but it doesn’t look like a U-turn by 2020.”

I want to point out that the IFS estimates that cuts in universal credit will mean that 2.6 million working families will be an average of £1,600 a year worse off.

The continued lack of ambition by the Tory Government to take fiscal responsibility means that alternative action must be taken in Scotland to put off the impact of the austerity we are now facing. I am glad that the Scottish Government have taken measures, as they have in their budget today, to protect the people of Scotland. The Institute for Public Policy Research, an independent think-tank, has found that low-income families in Scotland will face a reduction in income of more than £800 by 2020 as a result of UK Government cuts, but the richest 40% will see an increase in income as a result of the tax cuts.

We are in this situation not because of structural issues with social security, but simply because we have not been able to drive sustainable growth to a level that would drive job creation and, crucially, raise real wages, which is the best way of curtailing the demand for social security. We cannot fix the problem of poverty in our country by cutting social security, particularly in-work benefits, but we can do so by creating the circumstances that allow people to find meaningful employment, and in doing so work the hours that will assist them to put food on the table and to heat their homes.

[Heidi Allen]

Will the hon. Gentleman reflect on one of the elements of universal credit, which is that it is not just an IT system but an entire way for people to work with a mentor and somebody in the jobcentre who will assist them to build a life of better employment and higher wages? That is what he should be talking about if he wants to get people out of poverty.

[Ian Blackford]

Absolutely. We fully support that: we want people to be able to move out of poverty and into meaningful work that is well paid, where the social security system will support them. We would happily support some reforms, but problems remain in relation to the level of sanctions and the cuts to universal credit that will happen over the next few years.

[Ian Lavery]

The real issue concerns in-work benefits and people who are in work. The Sports Direct model is failing, but the Conservatives are not prepared to get stuck into the likes of Sports Direct and of Mike Ashley. They believe that that is a fantastic model of employment, but it is not acceptable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Blackford]

I fully agree with the hon. Gentleman. We need to deal with low pay in our economy. The only way to do so is to have a real debate about how to drive up productivity in this country, and about how to tackle companies that are abusing the minimum wage. Such companies must be held to account for what has happened.

We often hear from the Government and their myriad Back Benchers about a mythical long-term economic plan. I say “mythical” because it is a meaningless soundbite, and we are left asking, “Where is the detail? Where is the substance?” If there is a long-term economic plan to benefit workers, a core theme must be a rise in productivity that will help to drive up wages and living standards sustainably. The hon. Gentleman has just made that point.

Let us look at what the OBR said in its publication on the day of the autumn statement:

“Although actual productivity growth has picked up in the latest two quarters, some of this has been cyclical or reflects broader temporary factors… But since it is difficult to explain the abrupt fall and persistent weakness of productivity in recent years, it is also hard to judge when or if productivity growth will sustainably return to its historical average.”

It is well worth dwelling on that. It can be paraphrased as the OBR saying that it has not got a clue why productivity in the UK has been so weak in the past few years. It is certainly the case that the Government do not have a clue. I would suggest that they have no clue and no strategy for driving up productivity in the UK economy and for dealing with our social security bill.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) famously quoted from his little red book and then tossed it at the Chancellor during the autumn statement. However, it is not that red book that should concern us, but the stark reality of what is contained in the OBR Blue Book that offers little comfort for many in this country. We will support this motion, but we should not be having this debate because we should not have a benefits cap. We need a meaningful long-term economic plan, not Government gimmicks and soundbites.

[Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)]

I welcome this U-turn. Sometimes, it is right to accept that one is wrong and has made a mistake. I commend the Government for doing so on this issue.

I also commend all those who took part in what was very much a cross-party campaign, in which all the Opposition parties and some Government Back Benchers worked together. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen) for the courageous way in which she spoke out, which was noticed around the country and did this place a real service.

I also pay tribute to the other place. Although I will always campaign for that House to be abolished in its current form and replaced, finally, with a wholly elected Chamber, which is what we should have in this country and is the only justifiable way to run a modern democracy, it did show that it has a role to play in this Parliament. I commend my Liberal Democrat colleagues in the other place, who made it clear that they would speak and vote against the tax credit cut. That was crucial in leading to the U-turn.

As a liberal as well as a Liberal Democrat, I will always be extremely proud that it was the great, reforming Liberal Government of 1906 to 1914 that brought in the very welfare state that we are discussing. That is a great achievement of my party.

However, we accepted in our five years in coalition, in difficult financial circumstances, that the welfare state had got out of control and was no longer sufficiently focused on those who needed it. I was a member of the Work and Pensions Committee for five years and that Committee, which had members from all parties, was entirely clear that there was a disincentive to work and that too many people were incentivised to be on benefits, rather than to work. I am very proud that, in the five years of the coalition, we did a lot to tackle that.

[Ian Blackford]

Will the hon. Gentleman remind us how the Liberal Democrats voted when the welfare cap came before Parliament last year?

[Greg Mulholland]

I am very happy to. As usual, the contribution from the SNP Benches contained the usual milk and honey, promising everything to everyone and not taking any difficult decisions. In the end, even in Scotland, the shine will come off and people will start to see the reality of the false veneer of the Scottish National party. That is something that the rest of us will welcome.

I am not even sure that the hon. Gentleman knows what he is talking about. There are two different issues: the household benefit cap and the welfare cap. He seemed to confuse and conflate the two things. We absolutely supported the household benefit cap, which was brought in under the coalition, because it is entirely right and all our constituents support not having a situation in which a single household can take an unlimited amount in benefits, when hard-working families are unable to raise the same amount. The welfare cap is an entirely different thing. It seeks to control the amount of money that the Treasury allocates to welfare as a whole. He does not seem to understand the distinction, which is worrying, given his position.

Women and the Economy

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. These people make an incredible contribution to our economy and need to be supported in everything they do.

Not only are more women in work than ever before, but we are taking steps to ensure that work always pays. The national living wage, beginning next April and reaching more than £9 by 2020, will disproportionately benefit women. We expect that 65% of the beneficiaries made financially better off will be women. Further increases in the personal allowance will lift 660,000 people out of income tax by 2018, and 60% of them will be women. This reform, too, will make women financially better off.

We also have more women than ever right at the top of business. These fantastic role models are inspiring others to follow in their footsteps. Thanks to the business-led, Government-backed approach and the passion of business leaders such as Lord Davies, we have doubled the number of women on FTSE 100 boards since 2011.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

The Minister trumpets the fact that women will disproportionately benefit from the higher so-called living wage that the Government are bringing in. Does she not recognise that the reason more women will benefit from an increase in the minimum wage is that there are more low-paid women?

[Caroline Dinenage]

The hon. Gentleman could not have put it better. These are the women who, as I have said, were educated under the last Labour Government. Under our education reforms, these are the women who will be aspiring to higher paid work in the future. When Labour left power, there were more than 20 all-male boards in our FTSE 100 companies. Now, there are none.

--- Later in debate ---

[Seema Kennedy (South Ribble) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott). I have listened carefully to the contributions to the debate, and particularly to that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller). The motion is very wide and covers a lot of matters, but I shall focus on a couple of them. The first relates to infrastructure investment. Labour Members have spent a lot of time in this Parliament and the previous one talking about productivity, and they often use examples such as France. We could have a debate about whether the productivity figures they cite reflect the fact that we now have record numbers of people in work and those other countries have more unemployed people, but productivity is a challenge of our time, and I am glad that the Government and my right hon. Friends the Business Secretary and the Chancellor have recognised that in their productivity agenda. Labour Members talk about the proposals for infrastructure investment, saying that they are predominantly focused on sectors that typically employ more men than women.

If we look at the autumn statement, we see that we are talking about building roads, railways and flood defences. We are investing in the arteries of the country, but unfortunately at the moment these areas are still dominated by men—roads still tend to be built predominantly by men. I have met more and more women apprentices. I have employed them, in my former life, in the building trade and we want to see more of them. We are setting off down a wrong track if we say that investing in infrastructure will not benefit the whole country. Surely the whole premise of this debate, and of what the Government and all of us here are doing, is that we should be building a stronger country for not only our daughters, but our sons—unfortunately, I do not have any daughters but I do have sons. That should be for all of us.

I was slightly puzzled that the Labour party spent a long time attacking us on productivity, because when we try to do something about it, Labour Members say we are discriminating against—

[Ian Blackford]

The hon. Lady is right to reflect on the fact that between 2008 and 2014 productivity did not increase in the UK. What policies does she think will improve productivity over the next five years?

[Seema Kennedy]

I suggest that the hon. Gentleman reads the productivity agenda that was written in July, as he will see some good activity there. Productivity is the challenge, and if we want to compete in the global economy, we have got to be investing in this area. For his benefit, I should say that the report was called “Fixing the foundations”.

Another part of the same bit of the autumn statement deals with investing in education and in childcare, sectors where a lot of women are employed; childcare does not just benefit those women who can go out to work. We have got more childcare promised in the autumn statement. Those industries predominantly employ women, but again we need to be thinking about men working in them as well. We need to stop this divisive conversation that says, “Only men can be builders and women can look after children.” All of us, particularly those of us who are mothers, know how much we rely on our husbands and partners.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) for opening today’s debate. It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Portsmouth South (Mrs Drummond),as I hope to work with her on the new all-party parliamentary group on women and work.

Women form over half the UK population, yet their contribution to the economy is sadly not equal, and I fear that, thanks to the decisions of this Government, they will form an even smaller contribution to the economy. The right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), under whom I have the honour to serve on the Women and Equalities Select Committee, said that we cannot address many of the issues raised in this debate without a stronger economy. My question is, how will the Government ensure that women benefit equally from the economic growth that they predict? Far too many women feel that they are not benefiting from whatever growth may be taking place now.

According to the Women’s Budget Group, pursuing deficit reduction on the back of women—particularly lone mothers and single female pensioners, who are the most affected—is just plain wrong. If the Government had the slightest interest in fairness, they would conduct a detailed impact assessment and a review, and, if they were prepared to do so, they would revise some of their decisions as a consequence.

Why does there need to be a women’s perspective on the economy? Let us look at pay. My hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston once told us about a meeting that she had had with a group of women in Camden who had recently been granted the living wage—the true living wage. One of the women had said that those extra few pounds an hour enabled her to save a bit of money each month, and that she hoped eventually to save enough to go on holiday with her family. Those extra few pounds meant a great deal to her, because she had never had a holiday before.

Moreover, the little impact of the payment of a living wage by that woman’s employer was not only good for her and for her colleagues, but good for the company for which they worked, because the resulting increase in staff satisfaction led to higher retention rates. The company had generally found that 40 vacancies needed to be filled, but this year they needed to fill only two. Moreover, the change benefited not just that woman, her colleagues and their families, but the local economy where she lived, and the economy of whatever area she visited when she went on holiday, which may have been a part of the United Kingdom that depends on the pounds that are spent by holidaymakers.

The fact that a large section of our workforce are on low incomes that the Chancellor’s changes will not address is not only bad for women, but bad for children, bad for business and bad for the economy, both local and national. As the economy is the underpinning element of the debate, I shall now quote from an important document. It states:

“Ensuring that women achieve their full potential will have a significant impact on our economy:

Equalising women’s productivity and employment to the same levels as men’s could add almost £600 billion to our economy. This could clear a third of our national debt.”

Who said that? In fact, it was in the foreword to the Government’s consultation paper on the gender pay gap, which was written by the Minister for Women and Equalities, the right hon. Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan).

I am pleased to note that the Government have taken some lessons from the last Labour Government, including the lesson that, for most women—especially women on low pay—childcare is a barrier to labour market participation. However, if Members want to hark back to the awful days of previous Governments—as some did earlier—I am happy to oblige. My children were under-fives under the last Conservative Government, in the mid-1990s, and we had to pay our childminder out of our after-tax income. At that time, many women, especially lone parents, were effectively excluded from the job market. The Labour Government introduced tax credit, childcare vouchers and the Sure Start initiative.

We welcome the spirit of the current Government’s Childcare Bill, which offers five hours a week more childcare than the Labour manifesto, but, unlike the Labour offer, the Conservative offer was initially underfunded, and there are still a great many questions to which the Government must respond if they are to persuade us that that childcare will be flexible and affordable.

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The shadow Chief Secretary must begin her speech at 6.40, but the hon. Gentleman can speak briefly now.

[Ian Blackford]

(Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP): I want to raise, very briefly, the issue of unfairness to women and pensioners. Today, at the Institute for Government, the former Pensions Minister said,

“we made a bad decision”,

referring to state pension age rises. I think that many of us would agree with that statement, especially in the light of previous pension age changes which allowed a transition period of 15 years. Women are being penalised by the fact that the period is only five years for the current changes. Will the Government urgently recognise that this is a wrong that must be righted? Women must be protected. The Government must act now.

[Mr Speaker]

Splendid succinctness by the hon. Gentleman, upon which he is to be congratulated.

--- Later in debate ---

[Harriett Baldwin]

I will make some progress. We want to make sure that the pay gap narrows further and faster. From next year, we will require large companies to publish differences in pay.

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Harriett Baldwin]

I do not have much time, so I will make a bit of progress. Some 56% of the people who have been taken out of income tax altogether—in other words, who have had a 100% reduction in their income tax—through our increases to the personal allowance are women. Some 58% of those who receive the state pension are women—I will address the point made by the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) in a moment—and we have protected that under the triple lock. Almost two thirds of the people who will benefit from our introduction of the national living wage are women. Since 2010, women’s employment has increased faster than in the three previous Parliaments combined.

Let us compare and contrast that with the record of the previous Labour Government, under which the number of unemployed women rose by more than 200,000, or 25%. The fastest way to damage the livelihoods of hard-working women and families is to lose control of the public finances. That is the damage that we have had to fix, and we are making sure that that catastrophic situation does not happen again.

I want to address some of the important points raised today in a range of speeches—speeches from the hon. Member for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley), my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott), my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy), the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mhairi Black), my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Mims Davies), the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh), my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley South (Mike Wood), the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley), my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Mrs Drummond), the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) and the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford).

A number of people have mentioned part-time work. It is worth remembering that 80% of the people who work part time do so because they want to. However, I agree wholeheartedly with the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke, who said that she wanted greater equality in the form of more men working part time. There is evidence that that is beginning to happen, enabling parental leave opportunities to be shared more equally.

State Pension Age Equalisation

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Westminster Hall

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) on securing this debate. She spoke with passion and demonstrated the human and social impact of the changes that will affect women in her constituency and throughout the United Kingdom. I thank all the speakers who have contributed to this debate. There has been a lot of passion and appreciation of the challenges that women face as a consequence of these changes.

I say respectfully to my colleague on the all-party group on pensions, the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham), who is passionate about pensions and knows a lot about them, that we accept that there are issues of communication here, but this is about not communication, but fairness. The Government must recognise that the transitional arrangements are not right, and, on the back of this debate, they must reflect on that and make changes.

Members on both sides of the House agree that it is important that we deliver fairness in pension provision. To that end, there is no doubt that the significant historical gender issues with pension provision need to be tackled. Although we have made progress, there are still substantial shortfalls in pension provision for women, and the challenge of securing dignity in retirement is affected by women’s longer life expectancy.

[Dr Whitford]

We have talked about communication and the women who have had multiple hits, but this issue is also about the fact that, during their working lives, those women had such difficulty in accruing a strong pension pot in the first place. Women who worked part time, as my mother did—my father died when I was quite young—were not able to contribute to a significant pension at all. My mother worked for the civil service in Belfast and was made to stop when she got married and had children. Women who got divorced, as she eventually did from my stepfather, got no decent share of a pension pot at all. Those women have faced prejudice through their whole lives, and now we want to solve the problem of equalisation on one tiny cohort of women. That is an unfair burden.

[Ian Blackford]

I absolutely agree. We are talking about the state pension, but my hon. Friend is right. That is why I referred to the gender issues in pensions. We must address not just this issue, but some of the other challenges that we face, such as the fact that women who work part time do not participate in auto-enrolment. There are many things we have to look at to ensure that women have dignity in retirement. Much has to be done.

The SNP warned about state pension age equalisation in the last Parliament, and it is disappointing that our concerns were not taken on board. I should state that we agree with equalisation, but we do not support the unfair manner in which the changes were made. A longer transitional period is required to protect women. My hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford)stated in this chamber in May 2011:

“The issue is not only the pace of change. It is the context of a lifetime of low pay and inequality faced by many women, and the old-age problems that are a cumulative effect of that. The Government had an opportunity here to tackle women’s inequality in old age, but so far they have, instead, arbitrarily targeted women born in 1954.”—[Official Report, 11 May 2011; Vol. 527, c. 436WH.]

What created this injustice that many woman born in the 1950s are facing? Let us go over the facts. The Pensions Act 1995 provided for the state pension age for women to increase from 60 to 65 over the period April 2010 to 2020. The coalition Government legislated in the Pensions Act 2011 to accelerate the latter part of this timetable, so that women’s state pension age will now reach 65 in November 2018. The reason cited was the increase in life expectancy since the timetable was last revised. As mentioned by the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South, some people in the north of England, and indeed in Scotland, have a much lower life expectancy and will not receive the full benefits that the legislation mentions. It had initially been intended that the equalised state pension age would then rise to 66 by April 2020. However, due to concerns expressed about the impact on women born in March 1954, who would see their state pension age increase by as much as two years, it was decided that that should happen over a longer period, with the state pension age reaching 66 in October 2020. We must go further.

A shifting of the entitlement by six months was wholly inadequate. Indeed, I would say it was a mean-spirited move by a Government who have failed the test of fairness in treating the women caught up in the changes. With this Government, it is not about doing the right thing but about doing what they can get away with. No doubt the Minister will trot out the line that the money could not be found to create a longer transitional period, but it is all about priorities. When they can find £167 billion to spend on nuclear weapons, they can find the money to do the right thing and look after their pensioners. On this and so many other issues, the Government have a faulty moral compass.

Women affected by the 1995 and 2011 Acts fall into the following groups. Women born between 6 April 1950 and 5 April 1953 have a state pension age under the 1995 Act of between 60 and 63 and reach state pension age by March 2016. Women born between 6 April 1953 and 5 December 1953 have a state pension age under the 2011 Act of between 63 and 65 and reach state pension age by November 2018. Men and women born between 6 December 1953 and 5 April 1960 have a state pension age set by the 2011 Act of between 65 and 66 and reach state pension age by October 2020. The 2011 Act affects around 5 million people—2.6 million women and 2.3 million men—who will now have to wait longer to reach state pension age.

Women did not get a fair notice period. The periodic state pension age reviews established by the Pensions Act 2014 seek to give 10 years’ notice. In 2005, the Pensions Commission suggested that

“a policy of significant notice of any increase (e.g. at least 15 years) should be possible”.

Why was that not delivered? The 1995 Act gave 15 years’ notice, did not take effect until 2010 and did not affect anyone aged 44 or over at the time of the announcement. However, some of those whose state pension age was increased by the 2011 Act received only around five years’ notice. That is simply not good enough. Those with the largest increases—18 months—got less than eight years’ notice. Age UK argued that the revised timetable could leave many with

“insufficient time to prepare for retirement.”

The previous Pensions Minister, Steve Webb, said that he accepted that the period of notice being given to some women was “the key issue”. He also said in a debate in October 2013 that he recognised that not everyone affected by the 1995 Act had been aware of it:

“I accept that some women did not know about it, and not everybody heard about it at the time.”—[Official Report, 8 October 2013; Vol. 568, c. 54WH.]

Is it not an obligation of Government to ensure that people are aware and can take action? Will the Government accept responsibility for that?

In a submission to the Work and Pensions Committee on the impact of the Government’s pensions reforms on men, the Pensions Policy Institute said:

“The previous changes legislated in the Pensions Act 2007 gave men an effective 17 years notice from the year in which the changes were legislated to the year in which the SPA increase started (2024). The current proposals are giving men just over 7 years of notice (2018).”

What a muddle. What a way to treat people who need to plan ahead for their old age. Within five years of the current state pension age of 65, only 54% of the male workforce is still economically active. It would be desirable to give 10 years’ notice because around 76% of men are still economically active within 10 years of the current state pension age of 65 and could therefore respond to the policy change by delaying their retirement if they need to.

The Pensions Act 1995 gave women an effective 15 years’ notice of the year in which the state pension age increase started, but the current proposals have limited that to five. Only 65% of women aged 55 to 59 are economically active, compared with around 76% of men, and only 34% of women aged 60 to 64 are currently economically active, compared with 54% of men. Quite frankly, those women do not have the time to put in adequate provision to compensate for the changes. The evidence suggests that policy makers should ideally give women more than 10 years’ notice of any future state pension age changes to allow them sufficient time to adjust their retirement plans or to save more while still working. The National Centre for Social Research stated in 2011:

“In 2008, fewer than half (43%) of the women who, at that point, would not be eligible for their state pension until they were 65 were aware of the planned change.”

Women cannot simply have their retirement age increased by four or six years without even knowing about it. Ultimately, it will lead to hardship, shattering retirement plans with devastating consequences, including poverty and ill health.

The change throws up the question of the position of women with multiple low-paid jobs in relation to automatic enrolment. Women will disproportionally suffer further under new changes to the state pension under the single tier when they have multiple jobs. More women are excluded from the scope of auto-enrolment and will lose out further. Employers are required to auto-enrol workers who are not already in a workplace pension scheme, are aged between 22 and state pension age and earn more than a minimum threshold. The earnings trigger for auto-enrolment was initially set at £5,035, with contributions paid from the same level. However, it has since increased on a number of occasions and is now £10,000, with contributions paid from a lower level—the national insurance lower earnings limit, which was £5,824 in 2015-16. Based on Department for Work and Pensions analysis, we can estimate that the threshold of £10,000, rather than the 2014-15 lower earnings limit of £5,772, excludes some 1.67 million people from auto-enrolment, 77% of whom are women. The Government must revisit the inequalities felt by women born in the 1950s and they must do so immediately.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

I see that two or three Members are rising to their feet. I shall give way to the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), but I have only seven or so minutes and I seek to address a number of points already raised. I therefore ask Members to be mindful of the fact that the more questions I take, the less I get to put on the record.

[Ian Blackford]

I will be brief. I am grateful to the Minister for giving way, but this is about fairness. It is about women having the time to make adjustments and the fact that the period for transitional arrangements is too short. Such changes have never taken place in such a short period in the past. That must be addressed and there must be fairness for women. That can only be done by lengthening the transition period.

[Mr Vara]

The hon. Gentleman speaks about fairness and transition arrangements, and I will come to that, but I repeat the point that there is a cost to all of this. I am trying to make this apolitical, but given that so much political comment has been made against the Government and the previous coalition Government that my party, the Conservative party, led, I gently remind all colleagues not to forget that between the Pensions Act 1995 and the Pensions Act 2011 there was the small matter of a 13-year Labour Government, which seems to have been conveniently forgotten in everything said about communication, concessions and so on.