Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between James Cartlidge and Guy Opperman(6 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)
My hon. Friend the pensions Minister is doing a lot of work on auto-enrolment for the self-employed. Has he looked specifically at the so-called worker category, in which a person might do their self-employed work for one large firm that could, with willing and regulatory help, roll them into its employee scheme?
Guy Opperman
I would be delighted to take up that specific example and will definitely take it forward. I remind my hon. Friend that 12,000 people have been auto-enrolled in his constituency.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between James Cartlidge and Guy Opperman(6 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)
Auto-enrolment has been a great success, but does my hon. Friend agree that we need to do more to encourage the self-employed into it? What steps is he considering in that regard?
Guy Opperman
Myself and my opposite number, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey), were extraordinarily trendy: we were at a hackathon this morning, which is taking place over two days in Hoxton. The Government are working very hard to make sure that the self-employed have the benefits of auto-enrolment.
State Pension Age
Debate between James Cartlidge and Guy Opperman(7 years, 1 month ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Guy Opperman
The reality is that life expectancy has increased repeatedly across the country—[Interruption.] It most definitely has increased across the country in all socioeconomic groups over the past 30 years, and for all constituent countries of the UK. Mr Cridland, who was independent, did extensive work on that point, concluding that a universal state pension age remained the best system, and the Government agree with that point.
James Cartlidge
The Opposition spokesman said that Labour supports a variable state pension age. Does my hon. Friend think that that would survive legal challenge?
Guy Opperman
I will make two points about that. The first is that anybody who proposes a situation involving framing new legislation that lacks equality between men and women will have to deal with the Equality Act 2010, because any new transitional provision runs the risk of creating a new inequality between men and women and being subject to challenge.
Further to the proposal made by the hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill, the Labour party’s position in its manifesto, as agreed with by the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mhairi Black) and presumably the Scottish National party, is to reject any increase in the state pension age above 66. That would involve scrapping the Pensions Act 2007, the work of the Labour Government in the Blair-Brown years. Costs have been mentioned; let me be clear that the costs of capping the rise in state pension age at 66 in 2020 would be £250 billion higher than proceeding according to the timetable set out by John Cridland.