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Occupational Pensions

It is no good the hon. Gentleman shaking his head—that is what he said. How did the CBI respond to his claim? The then director general, Adair Turner, went on the radio to say that it was ““completely untrue? and that"““at no time whatsoever did the CBI support the policy…when the change was introduced…I wrote to the Chancellor expressing our disagreement.?" If the hon. Gentleman disagrees with that comment, perhaps he would like to intervene. [Hon. Members: ““Come on.?] It is the hon. Gentleman’s big moment in front of the Chancellor—he might get the job he is looking for. Of course, it is not just the Economic Secretary who has made that claim. The Chancellor himself made it at the CBI conference in 2004. In answer to a question from the audience, he said that the case for abolishing dividend tax credits"““was made originally by the CBI?—" a claim that we now know from Lord Turner is completely untrue. Since the Chancellor has discovered the art of the intervention, perhaps he will intervene now to disagree with me. No, he does not want to. The third claim of the Chancellor is that the tax change was done to encourage long-term investment in the economy. He may well say that in his speech today, but the fact is that documents released by the Treasury show that the Chancellor had known all along that that was not the case. The advice he received from the Inland Revenue on 22 May that year clearly says that"““the view of the economists is that overall the reform will be broadly neutral in terms of the amount of investment.?" Today we learn for the first time that one of the Chancellor’s own Ministers was warning at the time of the damage that would be done by his tax.