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National Insurance Contributions Bill

I thank the Minister for that reply and the noble Lord, Lord Newby, for his comments. I agree that this is a relatively weak amendment because it allows the Treasury to table the kind of meaningless content that we see from time to time—for example, in relation to Written Answers—and which has become an art form in certain departments. Indeed, it would give the Treasury another opportunity to assert that it was right, although I suspect it could not assert that it is a long-term decision because such decisions rarely are. The noble Lord, Lord Newby, made me realise that this is not the right amendment; the earlier amendments are the right ones because they put the proper parliamentary process in place regarding changes. The amendment does not deal with the issue of the Government separately pushing the personal allowance out of alignment. The Minister said that it would be in the Pre-Budget Report and in the Budget and there would be lots of opportunity to discuss it. However, what happened in the week before Crewe was neither in the Pre-Budget Report nor the Budget; it was conjured up at the last minute to buy the Government out of the huge trouble they were in and foresaw for the following week.