Pre-1997 Pensions: Discretionary Increases

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) on his excellent speech and on securing this debate, and all those who have participated in it. I thank the Minister for allowing me a few words.

On your behalf, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will mention your constituent Steve Mawby, because he has been a key campaigner in this important and very difficult area. I first got involved in it before I became a Member of Parliament in 2007, and I pay particular tribute to the late Roy Harries and Les Collard, because they brought to my attention the injustice that had been perpetrated on older pensioners by the Special Metals Wiggin pension fund. Hundreds of people were affected by that, and, alas, many of them are now dead. They were almost invariably widows, who were left receiving half of a much-diminished pension. These pensioners have not received a single penny in top-up payments since the legislation kicked in, because the company’s trustees have decided not to pay any discretionary bonuses at any point. The result is that those pensioners’ incomes are 55% lower than they would have been, and, for widows, half of that. It is an absolute outrage and a great historical injustice, and as the hon. Member says, the fact that an injustice occurred in the past does not mean that it is not important to address it now.

Of course, there was a clear blunder in the legislation. I have raised this issue in the House over the years, and it is a matter of great embarrassment that previous Conservative Administrations and the coalition Government did not address it, but there is now the opportunity to do so. On the Special Metals Wiggin pension fund, I recognise that the trustees are often directly or indirectly controlled by the company, regardless of whether they are formally independent. The company has not paid any bonuses or top-ups, and it is now owned by a large American company, Precision Castparts Corp., which is itself owned by Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway. I have written to Buffett, who has said that he is not willing to help either. It is a source of great sadness to me that even such a great philanthropist and entrepreneur such should have failed to do so.

My question to the Minister is this: given that the Special Metals Wiggin pension fund has been in surplus for many years, could he, as well as considering the question of historical injustice, consider the question of whether the trustees should be required, out of the surpluses they have, to pay top-ups to the pensioners? I hope they will consider doing so retrospectively but, if not, they should do so in way that is generous, that recognises the terrible injustice that has been done, and that pays proper tribute to Les Collard, Roy Harries and all the great men and women of the Wiggin pensioners, who we justly celebrate and whose injustice we seek to fight.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Torsten Bell)]

I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) has secured the debate on this important matter and thank him for the thoughtful way in which he described the impact on his constituents. He spoke on behalf of many others as well, and in particular those members of the Nissan pension scheme. I join him in praising the persistent campaigners on this issue. He mentioned one organisation in particular—I have met its members, who have been campaigning for many years and have not shown any let-up in their energy during that time.

A period of high inflation and the return of many defined-benefit schemes to surplus has rightfully put up in lights of the situation of members whose pre-1997 benefits are not protected by statutory indexation. That wider debate has rightly featured heavily during the passage of the Pension Schemes Bill. It was also discussed by the Work and Pensions Committee prior to the election. As my hon. Friend said, it was considered in some length here when we debated new clause 22, when we heard many powerful speeches, including from my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Dame Nia Griffith). The right hon. Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman), as he said, has been raising the issue for many years, and I have also discussed it with the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis).

I have met many scheme members and their representatives. Recently my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli and I met three members in Swansea to discuss exactly this issue in a lot of detail. I was grateful for their time and to her for organising that discussion.

I have listened, and I recognise the difficulties faced by some scheme members who can now see their income, their living standards and the quality of their retirement eroded by inflation, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham said. It is particularly understandable that members are disappointed when schemes do not award discretionary increases when they are in a strong funding position—that is obviously the change that has happened over the last few years.

As my hon. Friend will know, defined-benefit pension schemes have very different approaches to awarding pre-1997 indexation. The truth is—obviously, we will not be discussing these schemes at length today—most do provide for increases under their scheme rules; others do not allow it or require it at all; and a significant number allow discretionary increases only where there is agreement between both trustees and the sponsoring employer. Those are the cases that we are mainly focusing on in this debate. The result is that, in some cases, when employers are unwilling to support discretionary increases —even when the scheme is in a strong funding position—trustees can effectively be prevented from acting.

[Jesse Norman]

I will not detain the Minister long. If a group of trustees never pays a discretionary bonus, even though the scheme is in surplus, it starts to look like it is a policy of theirs to discriminate against a subset of their beneficiaries, and I think that is illegal. I would be grateful for his guidance on that.

[Torsten Bell]

I think there is a slightly harder case, which is examples where schemes had an established practice of paying discretionary increases—my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham mentioned Nissan cases from before the turn of this century, where that was the practice—and that was seen as the norm, and then, for different phases, such as when schemes slipped into deficit, as many did, they stopped and then did not restart when the surplus arrived. That is the case raised here. In many ways, those are the harder cases to understand, and I will come to how we think about such cases as we go forward.

[Jesse Norman]

I can understand why the Minister thinks those cases are harder; in some respects, they are less hard, because in those cases changes have been made reflecting circumstances. In the cases that I am talking about, there is a policy to discriminate against a settled group of beneficiaries. That is the bit that I think is potentially illegal.

Income Tax (Charge)

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Thursday 4th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)]

The hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) was absolutely right to highlight the second day of a Budget debate as a moment when we can discuss these bigger issues. I join him in thanking nearly 50 colleagues for their contributions, but I am afraid I disagree with him on some of his diagnosis; perhaps, in the course of my remarks, I can explain why.

The hon. Gentleman claimed that the Budget had no ambition. You do not have to listen to me or the Chancellor, Madam Deputy Speaker, if you want to know whether the Chancellor’s Budget had ambition; you can simply listen to the Resolution Foundation, which said:

“This was a big, policy focused, budget. It rightly sought to boost the recovery before turning to fix the public finances, in both cases with a large (potentially too large) focus on Britain’s firms.”

That, I think, is pretty clear. It also said:

“Continuing furlough to September will reduce the rise in unemployment ahead, with the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) expecting it to peak at just 6.5 per cent (down from 7.5 per cent). If realised, this would be”—

I am quoting—

“by far the lowest unemployment peak in any recent recession, despite this being the deepest downturn for 300 years.”

That would include the Labour recession of 2008. So we can only hope and pray that these measures may have something like that effect, but to suggest that they are short of ambition is quite wrong.

If I may, let me just remind the House of the scale of what we are attempting. There are three great themes to the Budget. The first is the need to support people and businesses through this crisis; the second is the need to begin to fix the public finances; and the third is the need to lay the foundations of our future economy. Those are all big issues. As the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde rightly pointed out, those are big matters which we are grappling with, and gripping, from the Dispatch Box and from the Chancellor’s own Budget.

Let us just touch on those. Supporting businesses and people—that would be extending furlough to the end of September. It would be the further grants we have made to the self-employed: the restart grants, a new set of grants designed to help the retail, hospitality, leisure and personal care businesses—I emphasise personal care businesses, such is the very important role they play in our economy—to get going again. The business rates holiday, which has been extended for three months before tapering for another nine months. Extending the VAT cut to 5% for a further six months before tapering it for another six. Continuing our stamp duty cut. Extending universal credit and working tax credits by six months. More money for apprenticeships. New recovery loans. A large package for the arts, culture and sports.

That is one component of this Budget, but of course, as the Chancellor has rightly emphasised, we must engage with the work of fixing the public finances, and that is why we are asking the largest and most profitable firms to pay more in two years’ time by increasing corporation tax. But of course we are giving at the same time, in the shorter run, a super-deduction. I think that is a very thoughtful policy. What that essentially says to those businesses—something like £100 billion is held on corporate balance sheets at the moment in the UK—is that we need to get away from the patterns of underinvestment by business, and this is a way of attempting to move corporate Britain in that direction. It may succeed, it may fail, but it is a very worthwhile attempt to kick-start that business investment that will be foundational, not just to recovery from the pandemic but to our long-term prosperity. Of course we have taken a variety of other measures to support the public finances and then to build the future economy.

The suggestion was made by some colleagues across this Chamber that the Budget was a piecemeal effort; that could not be further from the truth. Forty-five new town deals. The £150 million community ownership fund. The freeports in England. The infrastructure bank. I have been very closely involved with the infrastructure bank, and I can tell you that it will potentially be a very significant institution. It has, of course, its starting capital, but it also has firepower of up to £40 billion. That is not a trivial amount of money, and placing it in Leeds could not be a more emphatic demonstration of the Government’s commitment to levelling up, as the move by not just the Treasury but other Government Departments—the Department for International Trade, BEIS and the MHCLG—to join in a new campus in Darlington has been. As my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) said, that will transform that town, but it also sends a much wider signal: “By their fruits shall ye know them.”

It is all very well talking about these things. Those towns and areas could have been supported by the Labour party over decades and they were not. This Government are stepping forward to make that difference. Of course, the difference will not be just in the investment—the pounds, shillings and pence that are spent there. It will be in the lifting of expectations, the career opportunities, and the possibility of framing a new narrative based on different assumptions about how the world works than just those to be found in London. That is profoundly exciting and important.

Of course, we are talking also about the levelling-up fund, Help to Grow, and a very important development on future breakthrough. I love the fact that we will support not just levelling up but our green investment through the UK infrastructure bank. That will be a very important part of the picture. Let me turn to some of the comments made by colleagues, because they were very well taken. There are many areas where I am not sure that I always agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood), but when he said, “Go for growth,” he was absolutely right to emphasise the growth aspects of the Budget.

My hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Simon Jupp) pointed out, rightly, that the Budget delivered for Devon. He was absolutely spot on about that. I disagreed with my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) about corporation tax. He needs to understand, if I may say so, that the rise in corporation tax was the result of many aspects of things. What is noticeable about it, though, is that it did not trigger an enormous increase in business investment. That is one of the reasons why we have adopted this slightly different approach.

I agree very much with the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher), who pointed out the importance of the start-up grants that will support beauty and personal care businesses. He was absolutely right about that. He mentioned the town deal and the east midlands freeport, and rightly so. I agree with the hon. Member for Leeds North East (Fabian Hamilton), who said he was pro our UK infrastructure bank being located in Leeds. He was right to say that. That was not by any means the picture taken by the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon), who also spoke, but I think that the hon. Member for Leeds North East was right in saying that.

The point that my hon. Friend the Member for South West Hertfordshire (Mr Mohindra) made in praising the Chancellor’s honesty and directness when engaging with us struck a chord with me. I think it strikes a chord with many people across the House and in the wider public. My hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Jane Hunt) pointed out the importance of skills—absolutely right. My hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell) pointed out the value of the super-deduction plan. Again, I thoroughly agree with him.

It was nice to hear my great friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price), talk about the importance of her Thames freeport. That is right. I was surprised that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker) did not welcome the Liverpool city region freeport, which I think will be a tremendous boost to that area. I think she was wrong to say that. I think it will be widely welcomed, particularly as it gets up and running. I share the view of my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock on that.

I respected very much the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) as she sang the glories of Croydon. That was a beautiful moment in our debate. I very much liked the possibility that you, Madam Deputy Speaker, might, as my hon. Friend the Member for Watford (Dean Russell) invited you, teach the world to sing. I look forward to that very much. Perhaps in a future debate we can be treated to a yodelling intro in the style of the late New Seekers—or am I betraying my age?

My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) was absolutely right. He pointed to the town deal that existed for Ipswich. He pointed to Freeport East, and said, or implied—I am sure he would say—that this is a Government who do what they say. I am very pleased that, in that regard at least, we have been able to deliver for him in a way that we have delivered for many other places across the country that historically have been ignored.

Let me end by thanking hon. Members for their comments. We are trying to do something big here. We are trying to respond to the big issues that the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde rightly flagged. He is wrong about what he claims are cliff edges. There is, in each of the cases I have described, a tapering effect in the major reliefs, which is designed to return us to something akin to normality if we can follow the road map and get out of the position we are in. The fact of the matter is that, as the Resolution Foundation pointed out, we are in the worst crisis, the deepest downturn, for 300 years. That is not a fact we can ignore, and it is a fact that it is incumbent on us, across the House and in this Government, to address.

Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.—(Tom Pursglove.)

Debate to be resumed on Monday 8 March.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

13. What steps he is taking to help unemployed adults with disabilities to secure and sustain employment or self-employment.

[The Minister for Disabled People (Mr Mark Harper)]

The Government have published today a paper called “Disability Confident Britain” about some of our programmes. I know that brandishing documents here is generally deprecated, but because this is a copy of the House magazine of 28 November, I draw the attention of hon. Members to page 42, which featured an article about “Disability Confident Britain” and about the excellent event I attended in Gloucester hosted by my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham). I urge all hon. Members who have not already done so to hold such events in their own parliamentary constituencies.

[Jesse Norman]

The Minister will be aware of the excellent work done by the Royal National College for the Blind, which is based in Hereford, with blind and partially sighted people from all over the country. It has struggled in recent years with a series of annual contracts for residential training. Will the Minister provide a clear date by which a long-term solution will be in place?

[Mr Harper]

I am familiar with this issue. We set out in the paper published today the fact that we have extended the contracts until next September. I am making every effort to make sure that we can announce a long-term solution before the general election next year, so that those colleges can have some confidence in the future. My hon. Friend can give my assurance to the college principal that I will strain every sinew to do so and will keep him fully informed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 3rd November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

12. What steps he is taking to help people with disabilities into work.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)]

There is a range of provision to help disabled people, including the Work programme, Work Choice and Access to Work. We also launched our Disability Confident campaign to promote disabled people to employers.

[Jesse Norman]

I thank the Minister for that reply. Jobseekers with learning difficulties need support that jobcentres sometimes struggle to provide. They often do better when placed in social enterprises like Pack-IT Hereford in my constituency. Will he take steps to encourage such placements, and join me in congratulating Pack-IT Hereford on its work?

[Mr Harper]

I do indeed join my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour in congratulating Pack-IT Hereford on its work. That is one of a range of opportunities that we are looking at to get more people with learning disabilities into work.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We have not shelved anything, and I have to tell the hon. Lady that she needs a few facts to be put on the table. First, during a time of growth under the Labour Government—[Interruption.] Labour Members really hate to be reminded that they were in government once and that the reason why they are no longer in government is that their incompetence was so phenomenal that even at a time of growth, people ended up claiming food parcels. If we look back, we see that under the last Government the number claiming rose by 10 times. More importantly, let me inform the House of an international comparison. In the UK at the moment, some 60,000 or so are food bank users. In Germany, which has a much higher level of welfare payment, 6 million people use food banks—one in 12, which is many more, and it is the same in Canada. The hon. Lady should not always read everything she reads, particularly when it is her lot that write it.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

T5. A recent report by the Office of Fair Trading identified no fewer than 18 different points at which charges can be levied on a pension. Does the Minister share my view that there should be radical simplification and disclosure on pension fees and charges—however and wherever they are levied?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

My hon. Friend is right to raise this important issue. Over the last few years, we have taken expanded powers to cap charges and to require disclosure along the lines he describes. We will shortly act on our charges consultation and will publish quality standards, which will include requirements to disclose relevant information, including charges.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey]

There is one point to clarify: pensioners are exempt. If people could get the facts right, it would work better.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

14. What steps the Government are taking on pension charges.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

We have already banned consultancy charges in automatic enrolment schemes and, in the light of the recent report by the Office of Fair Trading, we will shortly be publishing a consultation setting out plans for a cap on pension scheme charges.

[Jesse Norman]

It is extremely difficult for pensioners, and indeed fund trustees, to obtain accurate and timely data about transaction costs, which can have an enormous impact on fund performance. Does the Minister share my view that managers of both private and public funds should be required to publish that information?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend highlights the important point that we need a great deal more transparency about the many different pension scheme charges—the OFT report identified 18 different sorts of charges. We will be looking at its recommendation that the fees he refers to should be reported to governance committees, which will be best placed to act upon them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 1st July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hoban]

It depends on the information provided and if claimants are providing good-quality information through the ESA50, they can be referred without a face-to-face assessment. I would also point out that the proportion of people going into the support group has increased in recent times, particularly as a consequence of not using face-to-face assessments.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

11. What steps he is taking to encourage jobcentres to work with local employers and voluntary organisations.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Hoban)]

Jobcentre Plus has a national network of employer relationship and partnership staff whose task is to work collaboratively with voluntary organisations to support more people back to work and encourage and support employers to open up their vacancies to the unemployed.

[Jesse Norman]

I thank the Minister for that reply. Newton Farm community association in my constituency has signed up a number of high-profile local people from both the private and the public sectors to mentor unemployed people in Herefordshire. Will he join me in congratulating the association and commending that spirit of self-help and mutual support? Will he also consider ways in which the Government can use jobcentres to offer further support to that and similar mentoring programmes?

[Mr Hoban]

I can not only join in the congratulations but say that the local jobcentre has a positive relationship with the Newton Farm community association. We want to do more work with local organisations to encourage people into work, and we are keen to support them in any way we can.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Let me tell the right hon. Gentleman something about empty homes. The previous Government left a huge amount of empty homes when they left office. There are now around 710,000 empty homes, which is 73,000 below the peak in 2008, which was under them. There are now 259,000 long-term empty homes, which is down 20,000 since they left office. The reality is this: the Labour party left a shambles, and never once did the people living in overcrowded accommodation hear anything from the Labour party about them. They are having to suffer while we subsidise to nearly £1 billion people living in houses with spare rooms. Perhaps he can say whether he, if he ever got into office again, would reverse that. Why does he not stop moaning about it?

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

T4. I would like to thank the Under- Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey), for her productive meeting last week with representatives from the Royal National College for the Blind in Hereford. Does she share my view that the best way to achieve efficiencies in the residential training programme is to encourage disability employment advisers to make more referrals to that very successful scheme?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

I believe that would be a good way forward. After the meeting, we asked them to put forward all their ideas on how they could really reach out to more disabled people and help more into work.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 28th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

It will—I can give the hon. Gentleman that reassurance. We are discussing this at every level with the local authorities concerned. The process will start at a jobcentre in each of the areas I have mentioned on 29 April, and that will start bringing in childless couples to claim universal credit, rather than jobseeker’s allowance. Over that period, once people are captured into the universal credit system, they will not go back on to jobseeker’s allowance, so a lot of tax-credit people who fall unemployed will move on to universal credit. We are in deep discussions with the regions.[Official Report, 31 January 2013, Vol. 557, c. 6MC.]

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

The previous Government’s record in commissioning and managing large IT projects was a catalogue of failure. Have my right hon. Friend and his colleagues been able to learn anything from that in how they have designed universal credit?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

All such programmes under Governments of any hue have always carried risk, because they are about change. The DWP benefits systems, including tax credits, are very complicated and often contradictory. Of course what we are doing involves risk, but we are trying to manage that risk. The best way to do so is to ensure that we introduce it stage by stage, so that we can recognise where we need to learn lessons, correct what is difficult or going wrong and ensure that we roll out the system properly.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

6. What steps his Department is taking to support access to lending from credit unions.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

10. What steps his Department is taking to support access to lending from credit unions.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

Since 2006, the Department has spent more than £100 million through its growth fund to encourage credit unions. In addition, since March this year, a further £11.8 million has been invested. The Department is now conducting a study into how best we can support credit unions and will report shortly.

[Jesse Norman]

Only 2% of people in this country are members of credit unions such as the excellent Money Box in my constituency, compared with 44% of people in the United States. What role can Jobcentre Plus play in helping credit unions to reach more people?

[Steve Webb]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his involvement with the all-party group on credit unions and his commitment to the cause. Jobcentre Plus is keen to work closely with credit unions, and we are currently piloting a scheme in Manchester and Newcastle in which jobcentres share office space to see whether they can assist credit unions at a local level.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jesse Norman Excerpts

Monday 28th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

17. What recent progress his Department has made in reducing pensioner poverty.

[Stuart Andrew (Pudsey) (Con)]

18. What recent progress his Department has made in reducing pensioner poverty.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Webb]

We will shortly publish a Green Paper with a range of options for state pension reform. As my hon. Friend says, one of those is a single flat-rate pension. One of its great advantages is that whereas many pensioners do not claim their means-tested benefits and therefore live in poverty, everyone claims their pension.

[Jesse Norman]

Like many Members, I welcome the single-tier pension. Will the Minister help us consider whether there could be an interesting interaction between that and a lifetime savings account, whereby people can take money in and out of an ISA-style savings account?

[Steve Webb]

Although policy on the tax treatment of savings is a matter for our friends in the Treasury, it is absolutely the case that the single tier provides a firm foundation for saving. Whereas under the current system, every pound one saves results in the clawback of means-tested benefits, a decent single pension will get one clear of means-testing to a far greater extent.