Oral question asked in the House of Commons, by David Laws (Liberal Democrat). It was answered on Monday, 8 January 2007 on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.

Occupational Pensions

Question: Will the Minister confirm that taxpayers are now making each year a bigger contribution to public sector final salary schemes than the entire contribution that they are making to all the private sector schemes, both defined benefit and defined contribution? On 23 November last year, his colleague the Secretary of State said that if these trends continue the Government will have to review the deals on public sector pensions. Is that Government policy now?

Answer: No, my right hon. Friend did not say that. It is right that we continue to develop the policies on personal accounts that will allow people to make contributions to their pensions, which is exactly the point that I was just making. I think that the hon. Gentleman supports that policy, although to judge from his response to our personal accounts White Paper I am not sure whether he is still part of the consensus. The one thing that we should not do, which I believe is his policy, is to take billions of pounds out of private saving and therefore undermine it. If that is his policy, he will find it pretty unpopular.

Secondary information