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Pensions Bill [HL]

I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this extremely well informed debate. I entirely accept that the Minister is not insensitive to the timetable and the issues that it has raised. I note that he, too, accepts that the notice period which has been given is less than ideal. He spoke about the simplified state pension, or single-tier pension, in response to a question from the noble Lord, Lord German. I am not sure whether the noble Lord gained much comfort from what was said. Clearly, it is a good idea, but the Chancellor himself, in introducing the Budget, said that this was a long-term project, so how it will help today's debate is less clear. I accepted when I moved the amendment that there is a difference on costings: our proposition achieves only two-thirds of the savings of the Government's proposal. Several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord German, made the point that it is a matter of where you draw the line. The savings we are talking about are not savings today, tomorrow, next year or the year after that; they begin to accrue in a brief period until there is an alignment of the two in about 2018-19. It is inevitable, when we are talking about millions of pensioners, that the numbers will be big. That does not make them any less important. Dealing with a number in isolation is not very helpful; we need to put it in context. We also need to look at the other side of the equation. The extra savings that the Government said are borne by someone: the pensioners who are the subject of the amendment. Several noble Lords talked about costs. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, widened the terms of the debate a little. He will forgive me if I do not answer in detail on each of his points, because I do not want to lose his vote. The noble Lord, Lord German, said that costing was about a judgment: where you should draw the line. The noble Lord, Lord Flight, also raised that point. Neither we nor the Government have yet factored in any changes to our long-term cost profile that would arise from likely changes to the state pension age to 67 and 68 and wherever that leads. The noble Lord mentioned the age of 70. Several noble Lords talked about the speed of change, including the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Ripon and Leeds. I think that the right reverend Prelate termed it a matter of justice, and that is absolutely right. He obviously speaks with some scars, as he said, from dealing with the Church of England superannuation fund. The speed of change is important. He also made the important point that the Bill is dealing with state pensions, but the changes being imposed and the extent to which they have disconcerted people do not help with general confidence in the pensions environment, which we should all be working hard to improve. My noble friend Lady Hollis correctly focused on the coalition agreement. She made the very telling point that issues around longevity and the data that are being used to justify what the Government are doing were known when that coalition agreement was written. They are not new data. She talked about the difficulty of women who have been away from the labour market getting back into it to mitigate the effects of these pension changes. My noble friend Lady Bakewell made the same point in a different way. She said that people formulate attitudes to retirement that are sometimes difficult to change. She also made an interesting point when she called for nuance. When you think about it, the difference between the Government’s proposition and ours is two years in arriving at 66 as the state pension age. The extra problem the Government have by doing it those two years earlier is that they have to mess with the 1995 timetable to change the timetable for equalisation. That does not arise if you do not start that move until two years later. We are talking about two years. It is not a huge gulf, but I accept it has not insignificant ramifications for costs. The noble Lord, Lord Boswell, talked about not insubstantial sums. As he said, the numbers are inevitably going to be big. When we are talking about millions of pensioners, that will inevitably follow. I am grateful for the support of the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, on this amendment. She has been a doughty campaigner on pension issues. She was relaying some of the concerns that many people have had expressed to them, especially by those who are going to suffer an extra two-year wait. The noble Lord, Lord German, focused on the interesting point that we are hearing those who are involved in advocacy. He spoke as though there was somehow a problem with that. Part of the problem with pensions generally is that they are complex. People shy away from them. That is why auto-enrolment and all those issues are rightly being addressed. We need people who understand these things and have that expertise to speak on behalf of, particularly, poorer people who are sometimes less able to deal with the complexities of these issues. The extent to which the noble Lord is relying on the single-tier pension to ameliorate his concerns about these proposals will be interesting, but I am not sure how effectively he will be able to do that. I hope I have done justice to each noble Lord who has spoken. I do not think the debate has changed my view of where we should be heading. I am well aware that it has not changed the Minister’s. This is a very important issue. There is a lot at stake here. Hundreds of thousands of women are affected by this, and their position could be ameliorated. On that basis, I wish to test the opinion of the House. Division on Amendment 1 Contents 214; Not-Contents 226. Amendment 1 disagreed. Moved by