Pensions Bill

Without indulging in too much nostalgia, particularly as I was not present in 2008—or was not present here—that relaxation was because of the change from 39 qualifying years to 30. That was specifically introduced to exclude the cliff edge, and the concession was only for people reaching their state pension age before 2008. As I said, I do not think that we need to get over-nostalgic. As they move through into the new single-tier system, both before and afterwards, people now have a broad ability to purchase extensive voluntary national insurance contributions, and of course we are adding to that capability with the new class 3A voluntary contributions. Therefore, there will now be a substantial opportunity for people to buy state pension.