Civil Service Pensions

Baroness Winterton of Doncaster Excerpts

Monday 13th July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord. One of the reasons I love being a Member of your Lordships’ House is that every day is a history lesson, including about history that happened before I was born—I say that just to make me feel better. The noble Lord raises an important point about transparency. He will be aware that I am the Minister with responsibility for standards, so how could I do anything other than make sure that my officials meet him to try to get him the answers he is looking for?

[Baroness Winterton of Doncaster (Lab)]

My Lords, as a previous Pensions Minister, I am aware of how difficult it is to persuade young people in particular to make proper pensions provision. The danger of a scandal such as this, caused by Capita, is that confidence in the pensions system is undermined. Can my noble friend the Minister assure me that government campaigns to make people aware of the importance of proper pensions provision will continue, and in fact be redoubled, perhaps in conjunction with the trade unions, who I am sure she meets on a regular basis?

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend. She is absolutely right. It is incredibly important that the failure that we are currently discussing and wider concerns about how our pensions operate are not seen as suggesting to younger people, especially, that they should not sign up to pension schemes. It is deferred salary and they are entitled to it; it is part of their overall package.

I was reflecting today with my private office—all of whom make me feel very old, hence my previous comment—on the fact that we are trying to fix their pension scheme. The first thing I did when I started working for my trade union, which is now Unite, was to write a guide for our members to the NHS pension scheme. The unions fulfil an exceptionally important role in making sure that people have access to their full terms and conditions. As for the problems that we are currently experiencing with this scheme, our officials are meeting every week with the FDA, PCS and Prospect to make sure that the workforce is fully engaged.