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Pensions Bill

I agree with the hon. Gentleman; I am a member of the Public Administration Committee, which has championed the cause of those who lost out on their pensions through occupational pension schemes. We do not want people to lose out in this case. Therefore, I welcome what the Minister has done in response to the discussions we had in Committee, by setting up the working group to carry out the detailed analysis and by making that information available to all parties as the Bill progresses through Parliament. That is important. Once the analysis is completed and we have a clear idea of what is happening, it will be important to have an agreement that changes will be made to the system over time. I accept that some issues may arise 10 or 20 years down the line, but we need to set in train those necessary changes. We also need to be flexible as time moves on. I appreciate that the Minister cannot commit future Governments, but we have to accept that market conditions change and so does the entire employment situation, and what we may be legislating for today may not be appropriate 30 years down the line. We need to be aware that this is a problem—the benefits trap is a problem now in any case, as it is a disincentive to work—and we need to put in place the flexibility so that as more information becomes available the Department can respond to the issues and ensure that people are not worse off. We all subscribe to the overall broad aim of the Bill—to get more people saving so that they have a more prosperous old age. When we address some later clauses and look at the earnings link, it will become clear that in terms of pensions this country is the poor relation in Europe. We are almost celebrating 100 years of the pension, but we are not delivering what our forefathers originally intended. So, I hope that the Minister will accept that we all have serious concerns about this issue. It is important that the information is shared and that, over time, we have a strategy that delivers the overall aim of ensuring that all pensioners are better off. It is unacceptable to say that small numbers might not be. Although we cannot legislate for every possibility, we must have the flexibility to be able to guarantee people that saving in this way will benefit them; if that cannot be delivered, we should not be encouraging them to save.