Pension Schemes Bill

Lord Gove Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 16th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gove (Con)]

Before the Minister sits down, he said that Amendment 4 is unnecessary because the Bill does not do what the promoters of Amendment 4 argue that it does. He did not say that it would be malign, that it would frustrate the efforts of the Government, that it was wrong in any way; he merely said that the Bill already achieved what the promoters of the amendment want and therefore it would be superfluous. What damage would therefore be done if Amendment 4 were accepted? In what way would it damage the Government, damage pension fund trustees or damage pension fund members? It is not good enough to say simply that the noble Baronesses, Lady Altmann and Lady Bowles, and the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, are wrong, and for us to take it on trust. That is not what we should do.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I say simply that if we took that approach to all legislation, we would end up with Bills hundreds or thousands of pages long, because we might pile on more amendments simply because they are well-intentioned. It is important that we are clear about the legislation that we are drafting, so that people in the pensions sector, lawyers, et cetera, can properly interpret what we intend—by any legislation, not just this Bill. When we say that something is superfluous, we do not add it in: I think that is a perfectly decent criterion by which to legislate. The noble Lord, Lord Gove, shakes his head. I say to him gently that both this and the previous Government have had a lot of criticism for large Bills and there is always an onus on us to have slimmer legislation. We will not get slimmer legislation by accepting willy-nilly amendments that we think are superfluous.

[Lord Gove (Con)]

My Lords, I am afraid that that answer is completely inadequate.

[Noble Lords]

Order!