Post Office Card Account

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Tuesday 16th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, it is clearly already possible to access cash from a Post Office card account through the network of Post Office cash machines fee-free. As the number of Post Office card accounts drifts down and working-age people move to transactional banking accounts, one danger was that cash machines in rural and deprived urban areas would become unviable and be withdrawn from the network. One of the things we have specifically done through the new contract is to ask the Post Office—this is ensured as a term in the contract—to retain cash machines in rural and deprived urban areas.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his announcement. It is good news for all the village post offices in my constituency and the pensioners who use them. It guarantees the long-term future of such post offices, and it is a contrast with the attitude of both the previous Government and the banks that are shutting rural branches. For the long-term survival of such post offices, the Post Office needs to develop its own basic bank account. Will my right hon. Friend encourage it to do so?

[Steve Webb]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend as an officer of the all-party group on post offices and, indeed, as a persistent thorn in my side on this issue, which he recently raised at Business, Innovation and Skills questions. He has shown his commitment to post offices, and I know that his constituents will respect the work that he has done.

We have left Post Office Ltd, as a commercial organisation, the freedom to design bank accounts of the sort it feels appropriate. It has come up with a series of accounts; for example, some have a monthly charge, and others have different features. It is obviously testing the market, starting—if I remember rightly—in the east of England. That is clearly a commercial issue for it, but we are keen to make sure that a range of accounts are available to people to meet their needs.

Pensions and Benefits Uprating

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Thursday 4th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. He is right that our ability to afford the substantial increases in the state pension in particular depends on a sound economic strategy. He will know that what we have been seeking to do is make sure that we have both a strong economy and a fair society, as delivered through this statement today. In terms of what happens post-2015, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has indicated that he wants to see the triple lock continued and I certainly want to see it continued. Indeed, I would like to see it as the law of the land after the next election.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement and on the tremendous work he has done over the past four and a half years after inheriting economic disaster from the Labour party. Will he confirm that the rise in the state pension next year will be more than double the rate of inflation as measured at the end of September as normal?

[Steve Webb]

Indeed. Those who follow our proceedings will note that we have had two consecutive questions from Government Members, because not a single Labour Back Bencher has any views on this subject. My hon. Friend is right. The increase of 2.5% is double the rate of inflation and quadruple our statutory duty to increase in line with earnings. Four times the statutory minimum seems like a fair deal to me.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

12. What plans he has to introduce the payment of pensions and benefits and begin accepting applications for universal credit through the Post Office.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

I assure my hon. Friend that all Department for Work and Pensions benefits and entitlements, including universal credit, are normally paid by direct payment into a mainstream bank account, the vast majority of which can now be accessed over the counter at post office branches.

[Mr Reid]

Millions of people have chosen to collect their pensions and benefits at a post office through a Post Office card account, but the contract is due to expire in 16 months’ time. Will the Government end the uncertainty and announce that POCA will continue after April 2015 with, I hope, improved banking facilities?

[Steve Webb]

We are in active discussions with Post Office Ltd and our colleagues at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Indeed, I am meeting ministerial colleagues later this afternoon to discuss that issue. I can assure my hon. Friend that I share his commitment to the post office network.

Housing Benefit

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Tuesday 12th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful, Mr Deputy Speaker, but my hon. Friend raises an important point on the responsibility of social landlords to build housing stock to meet the needs of local people. For too long under the previous Government, that did not happen.

My hon. Friend made the point that some social landlords have worked the system. One or two hon. Members have shouted, “No, that cannot be the case,” but I want to refer to the oral evidence given by Fife council to the Scottish Affairs Committee. Fife council saw the arrangements as a nice little earner. Apropos of two-bedroom properties occupied by a single person, Fife council said:

“we have under-occupied them to maintain an income from them”.

It also stated that the

“progress that we had made in maintaining our income by allocating properties with perhaps a spare bedroom is under risk now.”

I do not apologise for that. The purpose of housing benefit is not to subsidise social landlords who are using the system; it is to help people who are in need.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

The extra money that the Government have given to sparsely populated councils for discretionary housing payments has been welcome. It has helped Argyll and Bute in particular and other sparsely populated councils. Can my hon. Friend give me reassurances that it will continue in future years?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend has been a doughty campaigner for his rural constituency. I cannot commit the Government to a further £5 million—that is the amount allocated this year for remote rural areas—but I am aware that the Chief Secretary to the Treasury tends to be quite sensitive to the needs of remote Scottish constituencies.

Let me address the amendment, because the shadow Secretary of State did not mention the state of the nation’s finances—she used to be an economist, so I am surprised she did not mention the subject. The context of the debate is a deficit in 2009-10 in excess of £150 billion a year. The previous Government were spending £4 for every £3 they raised in taxes—that was not investment for the long term, but borrowing money to pay today’s bills. There is nothing progressive or fair about asking our children to pay the costs of current spending to benefit ourselves. That is why the context needed to be addressed.

Housing Benefit (Under-occupancy Penalty)

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

Jolly good. That was helpful. We cannot research the impact of a policy that has not happened. We are implementing a change that is designed to save £500 million a year, and we have heard nothing about where others would find that money from. We have said that, as the policy is implemented, we will research and look into its implementation, because there are things that we can change as we go along, one of which is the allocation of discretionary housing payments.

[Mr Reid]

I believe that the policy could be made to work if people were offered smaller alternative accommodation before a penalty was imposed. As my hon. Friend knows, however, the nearest alternative for people living on the islands in my constituency could be on the mainland, and it could be 20 or 30 miles away for people living in the remote villages in Argyll. Will he look at the formula for allocating discretionary housing payments to councils, so that those in the highlands and islands could add in the rural factor and get more funding owing to the problems of the remoteness and the islands?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend is very welcome to join the conversation between my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) and me, which I am looking forward to. He raises an important point. My hon. Friends have credibility in this argument because they have been willing to take difficult decisions on public spending, whereas Labour has just said no to everything, disowning its responsibility for the deficit and any willingness to say where the money would come from.

Pensions and Social Security

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Wednesday 13th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

The guaranteed minimum pensions order is a routine and technical order which provides for contracted-out defined benefits schemes to increase their members’ GMPs that accrued between 1988 and 1997 by 2.2%, in line with inflation. I assume that this will be uncontentious. The order paired with this is the Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2013.

I shall begin with the basic state pension. Despite the tough fiscal context, the Government remain committed to protecting those who have worked hard all their lives, which is why we have stood by our triple lock commitment to uprate the basic state pension by the highest of earnings, prices or 2.5%. This year the third element of our triple lock comes into play for the first time—our 2.5% minimum commitment. That means that we shall be increasing the basic state pension by more than inflation for millions of pensioners.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the work he has done as pensions Minister to drive through the triple lock, which means that pensioners will get an above-inflation increase this year. The days of 75p increases, which happened under the previous Government, are long gone.

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing that out. He will know that we have set a minimum increase of 2.5%, which is what we are having this year. Under that policy, it would now be impossible for us ever to go back to the days of 75p increases.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alan Reid and Steve Webb

Monday 13th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

The coalition agreement talks about equalising the state pension in 2020. Bringing forward the date to 2018 will not help to meet the Government’s target of getting the public finances in balance by 2015, but it will adversely impact a large number of women at very short notice. Will the Government think again and revert to the coalition agreement?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend has raised this issue with me before in debate, and although he is correct that the savings do not fall in the comprehensive spending review period, I would draw his attention to one number. Under previous projections, the national debt at the end of this Parliament was £1.4 trillion. If we were to delay the change, we would have to add another £10 billion. Someone has to get a grip on the national debt.