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Pensions Bill

My Lords, my noble friend may be surprised that another place’s reaction to his amendment is to plead privilege. For my part, I am far from pleased that the guillotine Motion meant that that House did not discuss the arguments at all. What price the Prime Minister’s pledge to give Parliament more say and control over the Executive? Instead, we got a knee-jerk reaction of privilege. My noble friend made a principled point that the Government should not be telling people what to do with their money above and beyond how that impacts on the taxpayer. This is doubly true when one considers what a bad bargain buying an annuity can be. The Government’s own Young review, the interim findings of which will be the subject of the debate to come in a few moments, clearly pointed out what a waste of resources buying an annuity can be. That the Government are forcing people to spend their retirement money—and it is still their money—in such an unprofitable manner is simply shocking. That they seem completely unashamed that they are doing so is no less than appalling. As we made clear in Committee, these amendments are a point of principle; my noble friend has just reiterated that. The issue that we were voting on is not how the tax provisions should be amended in response to retirement income funds as the Minister, and Ministers in another place, would like to make it. As the privilege reason makes clear, that is a matter for another place to decide on. These amendments did not presume to touch on it, as the Minister noted previously. I gently suggest that he occasionally read his own speeches, as I tend to read his. Instead, these amendments were an attempt to restart a debate that the Government promised but then failed to deliver. Where is the review on compulsory annuitisation that was promised by Mr Wicks in another place on 16 November 2004, at Hansard col. 1223, with ““particular care and urgency””? We have not had it. The Minister claimed that there was a point of principle behind his objection to the lifting of annuity requirements, but I am unable to find it in his response in Committee. All I can see is a statement where he claims that the retirement income funds do not provide a secure income for retirement, but there is unfortunately little more explanation than that. He should take this opportunity, as my noble friend has requested, to set out his principled objections more clearly. Indeed, the Government have already conceded the principle. The exemption for the Plymouth Brethren shows that there are less restrictive ways to guarantee a retirement income, and I assume that the Government were satisfied that alternatively assured pension schemes did not waste taxpayers’ money, since the Government themselves invented them. Can the Minister please explain why what was considered appropriate in that case is not now considered suitable for the population at large?