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Pensions Bill

The amendment was proposed by Baroness Hollis in the other place and carried by quite a handsome majority with support from, I think, Members of all the different parties, including some of my Conservative colleagues. It is designed to help women with broken contribution records to be able to buy back previous years retrospectively—so there is an element of a contribution being made by the women—and to increase the limit to nine years, whether consecutive or not. As I understand it, the rules currently refer to six years and they have to be six consecutive years. There may well be women who get to the end of their working lives and find that they have any number of years still unpaid for. The amendment has the backing of Age Concern, Help the Aged and, above all, the Equal Opportunities Commission. I have two issues to raise. I do not know whether the Minister will have a chance to reply. The Minister in the Lords said that the cost would be £260 million. Is that netted off against the means-tested benefits, such as pension credit, which the women might otherwise claim if they did not have this advantage? Would this really be an extra spending commitment if the Government, or any Opposition party, were to sign up to it? As I understand it, the proposal is not to change the rules on eligibility, but merely to increase take-up. All Governments, at different times, try to increase take-up by applying different methods to benefits and so on, but does that actually involve a commitment to greater Government spending?