My Lords, I shall say very little. I am so keen to hear the answer to that last question that I shall race through my contribution even more so than normal.
My noble friend Lady Hollis has done the Committee a service by opening up the question of the level at which the single-tier pension will be set at introduction. Both she and my noble friend Lady Drake have drawn attention to the rather dusty view taken by different bodies of the Government’s refusal to do this.
The Work and Pensions Select Committee was very clear about the fundamental importance of the principle that the STP should be set above the level of pension credit. That is primarily about means-testing, and I was grateful to my noble friend Lady Hollis for making the point that, contrary to what one would think from some of the headline messages, the percentage-point reduction in means-testing is really very small, being somewhere between 2% and 3%. That is not very surprising. One of the notes that we were given explaining means-testing and single tier confirmed what I think a number of us had expected, which is that, while there is a small reduction in the number of pensioner households claiming guarantee credit—pension credit—a considerable part of the reduction in means-testing on pension credit relates to those who would have received savings credit. It has always been very easy to reduce the number of people involved in means-testing: just make benefits less generous or take them away faster. You simply reduce the level at which you can get them. Taking a benefit away from people may reduce means-testing; it is not in itself an achievement. More interesting is what the combined effect is.
The Government’s response to the Select Committee was to confirm that it was indeed a principle of the STP that it should be set above the standard minimum guarantee and would be thus set, and that Parliament would be able to debate it as the regulations would be affirmative. However, as my noble friend Lady Drake said, the Delegated Powers Committee pointed out that this is the first time that this is being set not in primary legislation but simply in regulations which cannot be amended. I confess that this is not an area of expertise—along with many things that I talk about—but I presume that the reason for this is that, when Parliament is debating the introduction of a new system, it is impossible to understand the implications for anybody involved unless one knows the level at which it will be introduced.
I spent the entire weekend, apart from a brief outing to the marvellous Durham Johnston Christmas concert, going through all the details trying to understand
the impact on different people of all these changes. They are all predicated on the assumption that this will be set at £144. If that assumption proves to be untrue, or indeed if the triple lock proves not to be the case, then I have no idea what the impact will be or who the winners and losers will be, and all our debates today and in the many joyous weeks that we have to look forward to will be rather academic. Can the Minister be tempted to give us some level of clarity, at least about what the minimum level might be, in order that we can understand better the assumptions that the Government are making? I raised this question at Second Reading and, I have to say, got a rather dusty reply. The Minister said simply:
“We will need to decide that closer to implementation when the level of the pension credit standard minimum guarantee for 2016-17 is known. I am afraid that I cannot reveal all tonight”.—[Official Report, 3/12/13; col. 192.]
So I confess that it is not with a hopeful heart that I await the Minister’s response, but I await with fascination his response to my noble friend Lady Drake.