State Pension: Women born in the 1950s

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Patricia Gibson

Thursday 22nd November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered state pension equalisation for women born in the 1950s.

I stand today feeling the weight of despair, the burning sense of injustice and the genuine bewilderment felt by the women who, by sheer bad luck, were born in the 1950s and thereby inexplicably became fair game to be robbed, mugged and made the victims of theft of the most cruel and callous kind. For some women, that theft can be of up to £40,000 in lost pension. A large number of MPs—too many to mention—who support the Women Against State Pension Inequality in their quest for justice sent messages asking me to convey their support despite their absence. Many colleagues across the House dearly wanted to speak in the debate but were unable to attend.

In my lifetime, this could be the most unjust Government policy since the poll tax. It affects 3.8 million women, and 4,800 women in my constituency. The acceleration of the timetable set out in the Pensions Act 1995 has meant that these women have faced changes to the pension age abruptly, with little or no time to adapt and prepare. These women have had their pensions stolen from them—it is as simple as that. They paid into their pensions through a lifetime of work, raising their families, and often acting as carers for other members of their families. They did all the right things, only to be told, when it came time for them to be paid, that the rules of the game had changed. Not only that, but no one had thought to tell them that the rules of the game had changed—and that was just bad luck.

In addition, lower wages and broken employment periods mean that many of these women do not have a full national insurance record, so they receive lower state pensions than men anyway. Indeed, the average woman receives about 82% of what a man receives in his state pension. They also have a fraction of the savings of men. Equalisation is not just about the age at which people reach retirement.

With no time to make alternative plans, many women are suffering, and many are now living in poverty as a direct result of the political choice not to give them their due. Only last week, Philip Alston, the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, concluded that after decades of decline we are now witnessing a rise in pensioner poverty, with the figure rising in recent years by 300,000. He went on to say that

“a group of women born in the 1950s have been particularly impacted by an abrupt and poorly phased in change in the state pension age from 60 to 66.”

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Patricia Gibson]

I will just finish the quotation from the rapporteur. He continued:

“The impact of the changes to pensionable age is such as to severely penalize those who happen to be on the cusp of retirement and who had well-founded expectations of entering the next phase of their lives, rather than being plunged back into a workforce for which many of them were ill-prepared and to which they could not reasonably have been expected to adjust with no notice.”

I would be keen to hear the Minister’s response to the rapporteur’s words. If he wishes to intervene to rebut them, I would be delighted to give way, but in the absence of his seeking to intervene, I will take an intervention from the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham).

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The next best thing!

[Mr Cunningham]

I do not know about that. I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this timely debate. We have had many such debates, but the Government do not seem to get the message. From the start of the recession until now, women have carried the burden of the recession. In tax adjustments, the Government saved something like £14 billion at the expense of women. The amount the Government are saving through not doing the right thing by these women probably runs into billions. A fraction of those billions could take care of the problem.

[Patricia Gibson]

The hon. Gentleman makes his point well. It was recently said to me that it was interesting that the Government have chosen to pick a fight with women of a certain age, with a policy that will most harshly affect women in a lower income bracket. They will feel the most pain as a result of the policy, and were perhaps considered an easy target. Perhaps the Minister has views on that.

I have participated in every debate on the WASPI women since I was elected, and I repeatedly hear from whoever is responding for the Government—a variety of Ministers have done so—that the policy is about us all living longer. However, the debate is not about life expectancy, although we know that that has stalled; it is about women who had their pension age changed with little or no notice, directly causing considerable hardship.

Banking in North Ayrshire

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Patricia Gibson

Wednesday 14th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson]

I do. I will come later to the fact that no cognisance has been shown of the consequences for communities that the banks are supposed to serve.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on her timely debate about the whole issue of banks, which affects not only Ayrshire but the whole country. There is a trend for banks to make closures, particularly in countryside areas. People are left to their own devices, with no way of getting money, their giro cheques or other services. This is a national issue. This is the thank you that the public get for bailing the banks out in the first place.

[Patricia Gibson]

The hon. Gentleman has put his finger on the real source of the anger: people’s sense of abandonment and being left to their own devices with no other facilities on which to rely, despite the fact that the bank exists because the taxpayer made sure that it did.

[Patricia Gibson]

Indeed. I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments, which go to the heart of the issue of financial inclusion, social exclusion and digital exclusion. These things have to be worked out together in some kind of organised fashion.

At one point in its history, RBS championed vowing not to close the last bank in town, but now it is twisting itself into all sorts of shapes to dissociate itself from that promise. I suppose the PR men for RBS found the appeal of that vow attractive, but now it seems that RBS is embarrassed by it and is no longer holding to it. We have heard a little tonight about banking online. We hear about this a lot, and I accept, as we all do, that many people now choose to bank online. There is no dispute about that. If it suits the lifestyle and needs of those who choose to bank online, good luck to them, but many do not bank online, for a variety of reasons. As the hon. Gentleman said, many choose not to do so because they are digitally excluded; this is a choice that they are not able to make.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

The hon. Lady raised a very interesting point, because there is an issue with broadband, particularly in the countryside. A lot of people have problems with BT and broadband, and that denies people the opportunity to go online, if they so wish.

[Patricia Gibson]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about that. The banks talk about online banking as though it is a choice, but for many people it is not a choice, as they are digitally excluded. Many people may not be digitally excluded but may simply decide that online banking is not for them, for whatever reason. For the record, I put myself in that category, as I choose not to bank online. The point is that it should be up to the customer to choose how and when they bank, and it is not up to the banks to make that decision for us. But what we have now is a situation where the banks have decided, most cynically, that those of us who have chosen not to bank online must be herded into that particular pen, despite our will.

Independent Living Fund

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Patricia Gibson

Tuesday 9th January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson]

I very much agree. Local authorities across the United Kingdom face difficult choices, but many people, particularly in England, believe that they face unprecedented funding crises. In Scotland, we have tried hard to protect local funding as far as possible—it is not always possible—under budgetary constraints, but Welsh and particularly English local authorities have faced deep, biting cuts. Thankfully, we are working hard to avoid the worst excesses of those cuts in Scotland, but devolving something and not ring-fencing it when there are so many budgetary pressures creates a difficulty with regard to what is prioritised and what it is possible to do.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

On the hon. Lady’s point about local authority budgets, to take the west midlands as an example, Birmingham, the largest local authority, has to make cuts of just under £1 billion. In Coventry, that figure is more than £100 million. That is the type of pressure there is on budgets. My view, frankly, is that central Government should never have devolved—

Courts and Tribunals Fees

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Patricia Gibson

Monday 4th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

This debate is apparently about courts and tribunal fees. It is unfortunate that this Government’s programme of reforming courts and tribunal fees has been pursued as part of a wider Government austerity programme. In practical terms, this means that tribunal fees introduced in 2013 require financial contribution from claimants to have their case heard, and further fees look set to be imposed.

The governance and function of the management and operation of employment tribunals will be devolved to the Scottish Parliament in 2017, but the First Minister of Scotland has outlined her concerns about this system and expressed her desire to look forward to abolishing fees for employment tribunals. In the interests of justice, access to a fair hearing and fair work should not be the preserve of those who can raise the funds to have their voices heard, and it risks falling foul of the Human Rights Act.

We have heard that part of the reason for introducing such fees for claimants was to discourage weak and vexatious claims that, while costing the employee nothing, could impose significant legal costs on the employer. However, since these fees were introduced, we know there has been a significant drop in the number of claims accepted by the employment tribunal. Is anyone seriously suggesting that the drop can be accounted for by so-called “weak and vexatious claims” no longer being pursued? Surely the drop in claims must mean that many of these employees simply cannot afford to pursue their cases due to the costs involved, so they are effectively being priced out of the justice system.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I agree with the hon. Lady. Organisations such as citizens advice bureaux or law centres in Coventry tell us that they are inundated with people who cannot secure justice at tribunals because they cannot afford it. The real reason for the cuts in these budgets was very much the Government’s philosophy of making gigantic cuts, but the important point is that people are being denied basic justice.

[Patricia Gibson]

I absolutely appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s point: this is nothing to do with a justice agenda; it is about an ideologically driven motivation towards austerity that effectively hits people who cannot raise the funds for justice. Surely no one can defend that.

Research undertaken by Citizens Advice, which the hon. Gentleman just mentioned, has demonstrated that an eye-watering 82% of those surveyed who were experiencing problems at work said they would be deterred from bringing a claim due to the fees; and only 29% of respondents were aware that they could apply for a fee remission. We have heard a similar chorus of concern from the Law Society of Scotland and other experts, which shows that genuine cases are not reaching tribunals as a result of the prohibitive fees. The impact on women is particularly damaging and, as a result, unlawful employment practices are undeterred and are going unpunished.

Let us look at still further evidence that such fees are a barrier to justice. On 20 June, the Justice Committee published its review into court and tribunal fees and found that the introduction of fees for claimants in employment tribunals had led to a drop of almost 70%, as we have heard, in the number of cases. It found further that changes are urgently needed to restore an acceptable level of access to the employment tribunal system. That by definition shows that the Justice Committee, after its investigations and deliberations, found that the current level of access to the employment tribunal system is not acceptable. That is why when these powers are devolved to Scotland these fees will be abolished.

Access to justice cannot and must not be limited to those who can afford it. That is not acceptable in any country that seeks to see itself as enlightened and democratic. Despite talk of austerity, politics is about choices, and these choices are based on the shared values of the society in question; it is as simple as that.

The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who chairs the Justice Committee, says in its report on tribunal fees:

“Where there is conflict between the objectives of achieving cost-recovery and preserving access to justice, the latter objective must prevail.”

I could not agree more.

Worryingly, as has been pointed out, there has been a lengthy delay in the publication of the Government’s post-implementation review on the impact of employment tribunal fees, which aims to assess their effect against the three main objectives of transferring some of the cost from the taxpayer and towards those who can afford to pay and encouraging parties to seek alternative ways to resolve disputes while maintaining access to justice. Like the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst, I am deeply concerned that such an implementation review has not taken place.

I crave your indulgence for a few moments, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would like the House to bear it in mind that it is an estimates day debate. I believe it was Benjamin Franklin who said the only certainties in life are death and taxation. He was certainly right about the first, but recent events may suggest he is a wee bit off the mark on the second. However, there is another certainty in life that Mr Franklin overlooked: the one thing we may be sure will not be debated during a Westminster debate on estimates are the actual estimates. This issue may not exercise the minds of the general public, but that is because it is not well known outside this place just how little scrutiny there is of the spending plans of Departments. The scrutiny is negligible and it has suited successive Governments of all persuasions that it should be so. If the public knew just how inscrutable this process was, they would rightly be alarmed.

The estimates process is a very technical process by which spending is approved by Parliament. I further crave your indulgence, Madam Deputy Speaker, for just a few minutes more and ask you to allow me to recall that during the EVEL—English votes for English laws—debates the Leader of the House noted the possibility of a review of this process while seeming to be completely adamant that estimates already allow for affecting the Barnett consequentials. The Procedure Committee, on which I sit, is continuing to review the estimates process and many very distinguished and learned experts—far more distinguished than I am—from all sides have argued while discussing EVEL that the estimates process is simply not fit for purpose.

The way in which this House deals with the supply and estimates process is not sustainable. We need to have proper debate around supply procedure to achieve clarity on Barnett consequentials. The scrutiny of the estimates process is not robust and this Parliament has the least scrutinised spending arrangements in the western world—in this, the so-called “mother of Parliaments.”

Madam Deputy Speaker, I crave your indulgence for one minute more. Adam Tomkins, who is now a Conservative MSP, told the Procedure Committee on 8 September last year that—I quote him for fear of misrepresenting him—

“whatever we do with English votes for English laws has to be made practicable and operational in the light of and through using the Barnett formula. I think that can happen, but I think it can happen only if there is a clear opportunity for MPs representing constituencies from across the whole of the UK effectively and robustly to engage in deliberation and debate in the supply or Estimates process. At the moment, it seems that there is no such opportunity because…Estimates debates tend to be very wide-ranging—about everything other than the Estimates”.

He concluded:

“The fly in the ointment is to have this current inability or unwillingness to debate robustly and effectively parliamentary Estimates.”

The process is such that these procedures simply do not give MPs the full opportunity to scrutinise any Barnett consequentials of England only or England and Wales only legislation, and that is required in a healthy and mature parliamentary democracy. We need not take my word for it; we have the opinion of an eminent Conservative MSP—an expert in the field, or so I have been told. It should be a consequence of EVEL that the supply process be reformed in the interests of this being a “process of development”, as promised and envisaged by the Leader of the House on 22 October 2015.

I thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for satisfying my craving for your indulgence, and I will return momentarily to employment tribunal fees.