Oral Answers to Questions

Jack Dromey Excerpts

Monday 21st May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Of course, balls in court are always preferable to balls out of court. I am sure that that is a point with which the hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr) will be well familiar.

[Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State has said that the pensions regulator had concerns about Carillion pension scheme deficits in 2014 but failed to act. The Government went on letting contracts to Carillion, despite repeated profit warnings, and failed to act. Do the Government recognise that the consequences of their failure to act include the biggest-ever hit on the Pension Protection Fund—£800 million—and many thousands of pensioners losing out on their pensions?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)]

It was a Labour Government who created the Pensions Regulator in 2004, and I think we can all agree that there are lessons to be learned from Carillion and other recent high-profile cases. However, there are two options. We either try to discredit an organisation and run it down or—this is my choice—support the regulator, give it the further powers that we set out in detail in the defined benefit pension schemes White Paper and stress that the vast majority of employers do right by their employees.

[Jack Dromey]

The DB White Paper proposes criminal charges for directors who neglect their duties. Would Carillion’s directors go to jail under the proposed changes to the law? If not, why not?

[Guy Opperman]

I look forward to working with the hon. Gentleman as we steer the DB White Paper into legislation, but the legislation is looking at the future—it is not necessarily retrospective.