Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Barwell Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

Let me clarify the specific point. The statement by Aviva is that

“its schemes for automatic enrolment will have an average total product charge of less than 1%... It will not allow auto-enrolment into…older-style schemes.”

On the charge cap, the danger of the hon. Gentleman’s idea of having, say, a 1% across-the-board cap is that someone can tick the box with 0.99%. Actually, many in the market will offer below that. There is a danger that people will be misled if they are just below the cap, when many lower prices are available in the market.

[Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)]

15. What recent assessment he has made of the level of employment.

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

There are more than 29.6 million people in work—the highest number since records began over 40 years ago.

[Gavin Barwell]

In my constituency, unemployment is down by nearly 10% since its peak in February this year. We clearly need to do better still. Does my hon. Friend agree that, contrary to some suggestions, the evidence shows that that is not down to an Olympic blip, but that we are seeing welcome progress month on month, with more and more people finding work?

[Mr Hoban]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. We have seen employment levels rise. Even if we exclude London in its entirety, we have seen the number of people in work increase by 500,000 since the general election.