---

The Economy and Welfare Reform

I am disappointed at the hon. Gentleman’s lowly esteem in the House, but after his last comment I can only say that we may have a mutual estimation of each other’s worth. When I knocked on pensioners’ doors, they said that they were interested in looking at the Conservatives’ pensions proposals, but they asked why, in the whole of the period for which they were in government, the Conservatives only once raised the earnings link with the basic state pension, and left pensioners on £69 a week. Will the right hon. Gentleman answer a simple question? Does he feel that £69 a week was a good level at which to leave the state pension?