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Pensions

My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, for initiating this debate, which has been interesting and lively. I did not realise that he regarded my press releases as unhelpful. They were always meant to be helpful just as I am sure his speech today was meant to be helpful to the Government. I also pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Hollis. I paid tribute to her when I first took this job by saying that she would be a hard act to follow. From the speech that she gave today, noble Lords will agree with that sentiment. I also welcome the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood. He was a splendid chair of the Select Committee in another place and I look forward to the many conversations that we will have about the Child Support Agency as well as pensions. I have to sit down at 4.27, so I shall try to pick up some of the main points from the debate. I was asked some detailed questions and I will undertake to write to noble Lords, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Freeman, who asked a number of specific points that I would like to answer. Listening to the debate, the one thing that struck me was that, while we are clearly facing a considerable pension challenge, we should be wary about talking up the challenge in terms of an absolute crisis. First, we should start by recognising that many people will live a long and I hope happy life. Secondly, as the Pensions Commission made clear in its first report, which is the only report that I have seen—