Pensions Bill

Andrew Griffiths Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman talks about policy mistakes of the Thatcher Government and about previous Governments. Will he admit that one of the most damaging things for our pension provision was the previous Prime Minister’s £100 billion raid on our pensions when he was Chancellor?

[Gregg McClymont]

I assume the hon. Gentleman is referring to the decision to remove the dividend—[Interruption.] I say to him, first, that I do not know where he gets that figure from. I have heard it from Conservative MPs, in particular, but I would be delighted if he explained where he got it from. I would be interested, because anyone who has looked at the matter closely would say that the figure had been plucked out of nowhere. Pensions are a long-term business, and I am not suggesting that the only Governments who ever made a mistake were previous Conservative Governments. However, the fundamental policy decisions that set the UK on a slippery slope regarding additional pension savings were the mistakes the Thatcher Government made through the enormous encouragement given to personal private pensions.

The hon. Gentleman might remember, or might have read about, the way in which an army of pension salesmen was unleashed to persuade people that they should leave high-quality occupational schemes or the high-quality second state pension—the state earnings-related pension scheme—and go into personal pensions. They were offered enormous lump sums, not realising that such sums, up front, actually came out of their pension savings. They were promised enormous returns, and they were promised that they could pay less into a pension and get a much better retirement income. Where did that lead? It led directly to the private pension mis-selling scandals, whose legacy of public mistrust of pensions we all live with today.

That relates back to my point about the Minister’s approach. He is trying to build back up and deliver, or try to deliver on, a consensus around the Turner proposals—that is the right thing to do. However, if he is going for a hard, fast wind-up of the second state pension, with the losers being low-paid private sector workers, he has to be clear and convinced that every auto-enrolment scheme—10 million people are going into these schemes—delivers value for money. That is where my view, and that of Opposition Members, that he has not moved fast enough comes from, and it is evident in his change in view that I have cited. His view on the private pensions market has evolved. We welcome his movement, but we say to him that he has to move faster, and that leads me to amendment (a).

We have to draw a distinction between costs and charges. Our amendment would, in particular, make possible the disclosure of all transaction costs. The Minister alluded to that, saying, rightly, that we cannot have transaction costs in the cap. I absolutely agree with that; I do not know anyone who would say that transaction costs could be included in the cap. However, we need to ensure that the transaction costs are disclosed to employees and employers. He suggested that it was odd that the Opposition would want there to be a statutory record of costs and charges, but that is not odd; it is central to reforming the private pensions market.