Pensions Bill

I too ask my noble friends on the Front Bench to consider this matter sympathetically. It is not the first time that this has been considered in this place. In the past the argument has always been advanced that the uprating applied only in countries where there were reciprocal arrangements. I received a letter from Mr John Markham, who has for some time lobbied on behalf of the Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners, in which he states that in the debate in the House of Commons the Minister stated that there was no need for a reciprocal agreement with the frozen territories in order to uprate/index pensions. If that is so, it seems to me that the argument about reciprocity disappears and that we are looking at two groups of pensioners, one of which has frozen pensions and the other of which does not; it has fully indexed pensions. That seems to me to be basically unfair and a situation which really should be rectified. Therefore, I hope that on this occasion we shall have a sympathetic hearing from the Front Bench.