Superannuation Bill

David Hamilton Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Maude]

I can reassure my hon. Friend that that is exactly our aim. It is one of the great myths—I have sometimes heard this expounded even in this august House—that all civil servants are highly paid. That is simply not the case. As he says, the average pay of the civil servant is, I believe, around £23,000, and half of civil servants are paid £21,000 or less. In the pecking order, as it were, of the different sectors, average pay is highest in the wider public sector, private sector pay is next, and civil service pay is the lowest. So my concern for lower-paid civil servants is real and genuine, and it is based on a proper understanding of the concerns that exist.

[Mr David Hamilton (Midlothian) (Lab)]

Is it not the case that many of the low-paid workers have accepted those low wages because of the conditions of employment, which included a pension scheme and superannuation scheme that meant something? To take that away from them takes away the very essence of why they are there.

[Mr Maude]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, and the fact is that in any employment the terms that apply are those that apply when an event happens. People get sick pay when they are sick; they get redundancy pay when they are made redundant. The statutory redundancy scheme, which has the force of law—as indeed this scheme does, as it is a statutory compensation scheme for loss of office—and the compensation to which people are entitled when they lose their office is that which is in force at the time. That is the view that the previous Government took, robustly, having considered—I presume—all the issues as carefully as we have done. So there is a strong view on both sides of the House that this scheme is unsustainable and unaffordable. Even in good circumstances it would be unaffordable, but in today’s tragically difficult financial position—with the budget deficit that we inherited so out of control and high—it would be indefensible to allow it to remain unreformed, as a matter of fairness.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tessa Jowell]

No, I am going to make some progress—and I think that the hon. Gentleman has already made an intervention.

The very fact that the Bill is designed to expire within 12 months makes its own case for its unworkability as a long-term solution. Instead the Bill is being deliberately used to force the trade unions into compliance. As such it should be seen as a very unusual use of parliamentary procedure to ask Parliament to pass legislation that—as the Minister has made clear—it is hoped will not be implemented.

The Deputy Prime Minister has stated—presumably on behalf of the Government—that fairness will be at the heart of everything the Government do. However, as with so much that the coalition does, the terms put forward under the Bill do not meet the first basic test: they are not fair because some of our longest-serving, and often lowest-paid, civil servants receive no protection under the proposals.

[Mr David Hamilton]

Did the Minister not give it away when he made the point in his opening remarks that it is more expensive to get rid of those at the top of the tree, and therefore there would be an encouragement to get rid of those at the bottom of the tree? Will not low-paid civil servants be really concerned by the attitude now being taken?

[Tessa Jowell]

I think that those at the higher earnings end and those at the lower earnings end are equally entitled to be apprehensive about the proposals.