Pensions Bill

I congratulate the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Kali Mountford) on her thoughtful speech. I start where she started, with a note of consensus about the Bill. Although many of us have put this on record before, it is worth pointing out that the Bill has its origins in the report of the Pensions Commission. I pay tribute to the work that Lord Turner and his two fellow commissioners put in, as well as that of all the staff of the commission. The Work and Pensions Committee’s report on this matter pointed out that the way in which the Turner commission operated and managed to influence the political and academic debate, and the debate in the sector, was a model for the way in which such independent commissions can work to have an impact on Government policy. In the spirit of generosity, I congratulate the Secretary of State, Work and Pensions Ministers and their departmental officials on managing to deliver the Bill on time, especially given the opposition in government at the beginning of the process to the substance of many of Lord Turner’s proposals. It must have been tricky to secure the agreement of the Chancellor. We can only hope that his agreement will survive beyond any point at which he might take over as Prime Minister later this year. We hope that some of the proposals with which he earlier disagreed will be brought forward. It is worth reflecting on the effect that the Pensions Commission had in helping to forge an agreement on pensions policy. The range of issues on which there is now agreement between the three political parties is far broader than anybody could have expected, even before the last general election. They agree on the earnings link, on raising the state pension age—traditionally a controversial and sensitive issue—on the issue of women’s pensions, and on a number of other key issues, including auto-enrolment. As the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) suggested earlier, the Conservatives support the compulsory employer contribution. Those are all marked changes for the parties collectively, so it is worth paying tribute to the Turner commission and the Government for getting this far. I hope that the Secretary of State will excuse me for injecting a note of caution about that great consensus, because as he and other hon. Members will know, in the past there has been cross-party consensus on pensions issues on a number of occasions, and that consensus has not always lasted. Yesterday, I was looking at ““The Five Giants: A Biography of the Welfare State””, the influential and impressive book on the welfare state by Nick Timmins, now of the Financial Times. In an interesting passage worth reflecting on today, he recalls the last time there was major consensus between the three political parties on pensions reform. It was in 1975, when there were proposals to link the basic state pension to earnings, and to introduce a state earnings-related pensions system. Nick Timmins says that, in 1975,"““After all the controversies which had surrounded pensions for two decades, the Bill which was to affect the future of pensions of millions was given an unopposed second reading with fewer than a dozen MPs in the chamber.””" There are a few more than a dozen MPs present at the moment, but we will see what the numbers are at 10 o’clock. I suspect that today’s Second Reading may be unopposed, too. Mr. Timmins continues:"““The opposition spokesman who waved it through was a fresh-faced Norman Fowler, just a few weeks into his new job.””" Of course, just a few years later, the Government who introduced the Bill were swept away. The account goes on:"““A decade later, he””—" that is, Norman Fowler—"““was to attempt to consign SERPS to history.""But in 1975, the pensions industry was desperately concerned to have its future settled after the frustrations of the previous two decades. The new scheme did provide a clear role for the private as well as the public sector””." The Bill, essentially unchanged, became an Act, but within a few years the great hopes for a consensus proved to be a pipe dream.