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Welfare Reform and Incapacity Benefit

No. I am going to press on and deal with a couple of other issues, as time is short. I hope that reform of the CSA will be an early priority for the Secretary of State, and that he will undertake to make a statement about it to the House of Commons rather than simply to the Select Committee. The two other issues that I want to mention are reform of the pension system, and reform of incapacity benefit. I do not expect much information on pensions from the Secretary of State as he is entitled to say that he is waiting for the report of Lord Turner’s commission. The leaks to various media sources about the contents of that report seem relatively authoritative, but we will see whether they turn out to be as accurate as most people assume. When he responds to the announcement next week of the commission’s final conclusion, I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not try to give answers to all the points that are raised. We do not expect that of him, but we do expect him to give a signal on two issues. First, I hope that the Secretary of State will give us an indication as to whether he accepts what seems to be the consensus outside Parliament, and among the three commissioners—that the increasing reliance on a complex, means-tested pension system is unsustainable over the long term. I hope that he will make it clear that, even if means testing has been necessary as a way of targeting money on poor pensioners in the short term, he will move away from it in favour of a simpler state pension system that will incentivise private saving over the long term. The Secretary of State will also have to address the question of fairness in the public and private sectors. If the leaks about Lord Turner’s report are accurate, it is likely that he will suggest an increase in the state pension age to 67 or 69. It would therefore appear very odd for the Government to sign off on a deal with public sector workers that would allow them—even those who have not even joined the public sector yet—to continue to retire at the age of 60 for a number of years after the introduction of Lord Turner’s proposal to set the state pension age at 67. I hope that the Secretary of State will acknowledge that it may be necessary to return to the issue of public sector pensions reform. The office of the Prime Minister seemed to do as much in comments made to The Times in recent days. The matter needs to be looked at more in a more fundamental way. It is possible that a second independent report will need to be commissioned—not necessarily to be compiled by Lord Turner—on the future sustainability of the pension system.