---

Pensions Bill

I take the Minister’s point, and he was characteristically generous in accepting interventions. Let us hope that his colleagues are sufficiently restrained so that we can get on to the rest of the business. I should like to distance myself from Lords amendment No. 24, which was tabled by the Liberal Democrats in the other place. It is the only amendment that proposes to use extra taxpayers’ money for the problem. May I right the wrong in the Minister’s speech, as that is certainly not the intention in our package of amendments, which stand or fall together? It is an obvious analogy to make, but he said that the lifeboat was holed and was sinking. However, it is the pension victims who are already drowning—the Minister should remember that. May I pay tribute to their Lordships for giving their support on a genuinely cross-party basis to the amendments, which collectively provide a lifeboat fund to help the victims? We will vote for them as a package. I am sure that I do not need to make the case for helping the 125,000 people who have lost their pensions, as the Minister conceded, through no fault of their own. They have made their own case through their courage, persistence and dignity. We have helped them to make that case in debate after debate and Question Time after Question Time. In recent weeks, we have heard a great deal about the new Prime Minister’s ““moral compass””. He has spoken endlessly of change, and promised an end to the culture of spin. Yet the reality has been more of the same. Over the past few days, the Government have been frantically spinning in the media that the amendments are flawed in some way, that the unclaimed assets do not exist and so on. The Prime Minister likes to claim, as the Minister did today, that as things stand under the FAS, the victims will receive 80 per cent. of their pensions. Indeed, he told GMTV recently:"““Every single one of the 125,000 will get back at least 80 per cent. of their pension.””" We all know that that is wholly inaccurate and misleading. The new Secretary of State is clearly a fast learner. In his first appearance at the Dispatch Box, he confused ““expected pension”” with the Government-created concept of ““core pension””. He was at it again in The Independent today. He said:"““We believe we will be able to move the 80 per cent. guarantee””—" that is the word that he used—"““from the taxpayer further towards 90 per cent.””" The Minister himself talked about the expected core pension, which is a ludicrous concept that puts together the expected pension—what people expect to receive—and the core pension, which is a construct of the FAS. Only the other day, in unveiling his ““Not the Queen’s Speech””, the Prime Minister referred to an unclaimed assets Bill to be introduced later this year. He challenged us to support it, but failed to make any connection between the use of those assets and helping the pensions victims. It is as if he wished they would disappear. Sadly some of them have done so, and some of them will. That 80 or 90 per cent.—of what is it 80 or 90 per cent.? The truth is that the FAS was set up in a hurry as a political expedient and was inadequately funded from the outset. It had to be set up in a different location with different staff almost to underline the fact that it was always going to be the poor relation to the PPF. Then the Government had to invent the novel concept of the core pension to make it sound even remotely credible. What does that mean in practice? The PPF includes some inflation linking; the FAS has none. The PPF pays from the scheme pension age, but the FAS only at 65. The FAS does not allow for tax-free lump sums, or ill health or early retirement benefits, except for the terminally ill. The FAS does nothing for dependent children and little for widows. So most victims subject to the FAS will be lucky to get half their expected pension, and many will receive far less. If the era of spin is at an end, why will the Government or the Prime Minister not listen? They were found guilty of maladministration by the ombudsman. They decided to ignore constitutional law and practice by saying that it was Ministers’ job to second-guess the ombudsman on those findings. The Select Committee told the Government that they were wrong. They ignored it. The European Court said that the Government were wrong. They ignored it, too. The High Court told them, so they decided to appeal. Now, in an almost unprecedented move, the Select Committee has issued a report aimed directly at today’s debate and giving guidance to hon. Members on how to vote. Reading between the lines, it is clear that when these matters were last debated in the Chamber, the able Chairman of the Select Committee felt that he was led up the garden path by the then Minister. The Select Committee supports the view that those who have lost pensions where a solvent employer has wound up the scheme should also be included. That is the purport of amendment (a). The Committee states that"““the losses suffered by scheme members are identical, whether or not an employer still exists.””" That is the nub of Lords amendment No. 16.