Smith Commission

Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Anne Begg

Thursday 27th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Carmichael]

Indeed; I could not agree more. The Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition made a vow during the referendum campaign. Today we honour that vow. The former First Minister and his successor—Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon—also made a vow. They said that they would respect the outcome of the referendum and the decision of the people of Scotland. There is no reason from today for them to do anything other than to make it clear that we will not be returning to this question in a referendum, as they said, in a generation.

[Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)]

I, too, welcome the announcement today. It has delivered more than the vow—perhaps we could call it the vow plus. There is certainly more in the statement than was expected.

I welcome the fact that quite a lot of welfare is to be devolved, but it is right that pensions, especially the state pension, should remain reserved, because throughout the campaign and in all the polling, Scottish people, even many yes voters, thought that pensions should remain part of the UK. When can we expect to see the detail of how some of this will work in practice? Not until the detail is available to all Members will we know whether it is practical or not that some of these powers should be devolved.

[Mr Carmichael]

I like the hon. Lady’s formulation, “the vow plus”. My party leader in Scotland, Willie Rennie, said this morning that this was “the vow max”. I agree with him on that. The hon. Lady is right to highlight that the state pension will remain part of the United Kingdom welfare system. That is one of the most significant parts of the social union that the people of Scotland chose to remain part of on 18 September.

As for the detail, as Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, the hon. Lady will doubtless have an important role to play in working it out.