Pensions Bill

I thank the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk (Mr. Bellingham) for curtailing his comments, and I shall try to curtail mine. On 22 January 2002, I was fortunate enough to secure a debate in Westminster Hall that allowed me to raise the plight of more than 1,000 former workers of United Engineering Forgings in the United Kingdom who had lost most of their expected pensions when the company went into administration. Since then, as we have heard, along with my colleagues on the Labour Benches, I have tabled early-day motions, tabled amendments, met Ministers and generally campaigned with the trade unions for a solution to what I still see as a major injustice. The Government recognised that injustice and the fact that hard-working people had been affected, but they did not recognise that compensation was required. However, as other hon. Members have said in the debate today, we achieved incremental success in securing help for those who lost out and, crucially, legislation has been passed to ensure that never again will people be deprived of the pensions that they have paid into all their working lives. The Government have said at every stage of the debate so far that they have gone as far as they can go, and subsequently, they have gone further. So I am very interested to hear what the Minister said about the fact that they are prepared to go further again. There is no question but that a substantial amount of public money has been allocated to the financial assistance scheme—something that has not been adequately recognised in the debate or in general over the past five years. The Conservative party said before the last election that it would not commit any further public money than had been committed already to the financial assistance scheme. I wonder whether I can take from that that the Conservatives would not have come up with the £8 billion that is now in the pension pot?