State Pension Age: Review

Jonathan Ashworth Excerpts

Thursday 30th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement and thank Baroness Neville-Rolfe and the Government Actuary for their reports.

The Opposition agree that it is not the right time to accelerate a rise in the state pension age, although I note that five years or so ago the then Secretary of State announced that it was explicit Government policy to bring forward the increase in the state pension age to 68 between 2037 and 2039. When objections were raised on the grounds of life expectancy trends, the Government said that such objections were irresponsible and reckless. They told us that bringing forward an increase was necessary for the long-term sustainability of the public finances. Now it turns out that, with a general election only a year or so away and the Government trailing so badly in the polls, abandoning the accelerated rise in the state pension age is not so reckless and irresponsible after all.

Can the Secretary of State confirm whether the review he has announced will still consider bringing forward an increase in the state retirement age to 2037? Does that remain the Government’s policy ambition, or is that now abandoned?

The Secretary of State cites life expectancy trends. It is certainly true that our trends were hit hard by the pandemic, but that is because life expectancy improvements were slowing before the pandemic. The life expectancy gap between the richest and poorest communities was widening before the pandemic, and—disgracefully and shamefully—in around one in five of the poorest areas for women and one in nine of the poorest areas for men, life expectancy went backwards from 2014 to 2019. He should have acknowledged that today.

The ongoing stalling of life expectancy is out of kilter with many of our European competitors. It is much more dramatic and it means that, in a city such as Manchester, Middlesbrough or Liverpool or a town such as Blackpool, life expectancy for men is nine to 10 years lower and for women eight years lower than in the wealthiest parts of Chelsea or Westminster. In Glasgow, as The Sunday Post recently warned, one in four men will die before their 65th birthday. That is a quite shameful record.

Why do the Government think, after 13 years, life expectancy trends have become so dismal in the United Kingdom? It is not just because so many more people are waiting for treatment in the NHS, or cannot access health check-ups for blood pressure, cardiovascular disease or cancers. It is not simply because smoking cessation services have been so cut under this Government. It is not simply because mental health services are overwhelmed, addiction services have been cut back and we are now seeing the phenomena of deaths of despair in the UK. It is not simply because social care provision has been so savaged. It is also because poverty makes people ill quicker and it means people die sooner.

After 13 years, wages are stagnant and jobs insecure. Too much housing in the private rented sector is damp and squalid. Today, there are 400,000 more pensioners in relative poverty, 1 million more children in poverty and half a million children destitute, without a bed to sleep in tonight or a hot dinner in their stomach, after 13 years of the Conservatives.

Today’s announcement that the Government are not going ahead with accelerating the state pension age rise is welcome, and it is the right decision, but it is the clearest admission yet that a rising tide of poverty is dragging life expectancy down for so many. Life expectancy that is stalling—even going backwards in some of the poorest communities—is a damning indictment of 13 years of failure, which the Minister should have acknowledged and apologised for today.

[Mel Stride]

I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman has broadly welcomed the decisions that I set out in my statement. I will address a couple of the points he raises. On poverty and, as we are particularly focused on pensioners, pensioner poverty, the situation has improved. The poverty situation has improved right across the board since 2009-10, with some dramatic reductions to both absolute and relative poverty levels across that period, not least because of the policies pursued by this Government. He suggests we are something of an outlier in terms of the flattening of the increase in the expectations of length of life in future. That is simply not the case; as I said earlier, it is an international phenomenon.

The right hon. Gentleman raised a couple of questions I would like to address. First, he asked whether a move of the rise of the pension age to 68 was possible, along the lines of the Cridland recommendations of 2037 to 2039. Given we have made a commitment to a 10-year notice period, that would suggest that, if the next review —and I say if, because that is for others to decide in the course of time—were in, say, 2026, that would indeed make those dates possible. Of course, it would not preclude decisions being taken for dates further out than 2037 to 2039.

Secondly, the right hon. Gentleman asks what our policy is at the moment. We are very clear what our policy is: the current legislative position is appropriate, but there will be a review within the first two years of the next Parliament.