NHS Pensions: Taxation

Debate between Elizabeth Truss and Peter Bottomley

Monday 8th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I will raise that matter with the Health Secretary. It is for the NHS to make sure that its pensions are properly administrated. As I have said, we are dealing with this issue urgently. We are not waiting for the election of a new Conservative Prime Minister to do that. My point about a new Prime Minister was that general tax and pension reforms are not likely to be happening in the next two weeks.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for her statement. Will she confirm that this problem, as she said at the beginning, was created in 2016? Working hard for a few weeks now is probably necessary, but it ought to have been possible, by paying attention to the representatives of consultants and GPs and to those in these sorts of areas with similar earnings, to realise that this problem should not have been allowed to continue for quite so long. Will the Minister’s advisers look at the British Medical Association’s “Frequently asked questions”, which in February spelt out many of these issues? I ask, for the sake of those involved and the patients they wish to serve, that there should be a bit more speed—I almost gave it in Latin, but I might have sounded like a Tory leadership candidate. Get on with it, please.

[Elizabeth Truss]

I am strongly receiving the message in favour of urgency.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Elizabeth Truss and Peter Bottomley

Tuesday 6th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

In the Budget, we announced an additional £630 for every family on UC. The Resolution Foundation has confirmed that this is more generous than the previous benefits system, but it is also better at keeping people in work. The reality is that if the Labour party was in power there would be no money to spend on those families, there would be no money for tax cuts and taxes would be going up for ordinary people.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

The Minister knows this, but can she explain to Opposition Members that helping people into work and into higher rates of work, and keeping the credits and benefits they are entitled to matters, and that if Labour’s policy of freezing the roll-out of UC came in many people would not get the support they need to help them have the lives they want?

[Elizabeth Truss]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Under the previous Labour Government, we saw 20% of young people unemployed and we saw families trapped on benefits. What we have done is create a system where it pays to work. There are now a record number of children in houses where parents are out at work. That is good for them and good for the next generation.