State Pension Age: Women

Robert Neill Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

What we are trying to do is what I am talking about, which is remove barriers to work, so that it is easier for these people to work. The arrival of universal credit makes it easier for people to extend the hours they work, so that they do not hit the old cliff edges under the other benefits. Paid employment maximises people’s opportunities to build up savings—the point the right hon. Lady was just making—and helps to maintain social networks, and it is beneficial to health, provided the employment takes into account the person’s broader circumstances.

[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

I appreciate that the SNP’s proposal is not economically viable, but does the Minister accept that some women, including in my constituency, had to give up work for health reasons and were therefore not able to pay in, and they are not able to return to the workplace either? It does not seem that we have yet put in place adequate measures to be fair to those people, who cannot change their situation.

[Damian Green]

Absolutely, I quite take the point that my hon. Friend makes. Clearly, specific issues need to be dealt with for this group, and I am going through several of them now. Some of these people will not be able to work, as I made clear at the start; this touches on one of the four principles I set out at the start of my speech. Working-age benefits are specifically designed to help such people, and I wish to make it clear that this group of women will be entitled to working-age benefits. If there are barriers to their claiming them, we need to remove those barriers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will come on to that in the very limited time available.

I am concerned that the Government’s amendment to the motion is just another example of them sticking their head in the sand and hoping the problem will go away. I acknowledge the wisdom of Mr Speaker in selecting the Government amendment, rather than those in my name and other hon. Members, but it appears to have little to do with the subject of the debate—the effect of pension age equalisation on WASPI women. I welcome the average rise of £550 a year for 3 million women. I welcome the increases in the basic pension, which the Secretary of State talked about. I welcome the introduction of the triple lock. Frankly, however, to produce such an amendment adds insult to injury. WASPI women will not be able to enjoy those benefits for up to six further years. That is the whole point. These women will not qualify for the benefits for a much longer time and they need help now. In addition, and despite what we have heard, women’s life expectancy actually fell last year for the first time in many years. The Chancellor, understandably, recently declined to guarantee the triple lock for years to come. By the time many of the WASPI women qualify, they will not be able to enjoy the security of the triple lock. That is why I cannot support the Government amendment. I urge hon. Members to refrain from supporting it, too. Frankly, to vote for such a disappointing and inappropriate amendment would be an insult to the many WASPI women who have campaigned so hard.

I also have a problem with the SNP motion. Mr Speaker, you were lucky enough not to be here when the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) spent 36 minutes losing my vote. SNP Members have been unilaterally pushing this cause. I am grateful that they do so, but in Scotland they do not have to pay for it. That is why we never hear solutions from the SNP. The motion references the Landman report, which relies heavily on the magic money tree known as the national insurance fund. We know the fund has been in deficit and that the Government, who have a responsibility for pensions up and down the country, had to top it up. The SNP suggestion is, in reality, a pension fund-raiding exercise.

I am disappointed that Mr Speaker did not choose my amendment, simply because it asked for a dialogue to be opened up—that we prioritise looking at the most extreme cases of hardship, which we all now see in our surgeries. The amendment does not commit to specific substantial spending and it certainly does not call for a reversion to the pre-1995 status quo. We support pension age equalisation. It is just that the speed of the transition process has led to unintended consequences for a large number of women. Many hon. Members have seen cases at first hand in their surgeries. We just want to talk.

[Robert Neill]

I agree that it is regrettable that we were not able to debate my hon. Friend’s amendment. I would have supported it. Does he agree that we are where we are, and that we should not go down the extravagant SNP route? We should take the Secretary of State up on his offer of dialogue to find something constructive for those most in need.

[Tim Loughton]

I agree. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for seeing a delegation from the all-party group just a few days ago, even though there is no preparedness to discuss specific options. He has, however, offered to look at examples of hardship, particularly where women are being offered very inappropriate and impractical jobs by jobcentres up and down the country. We have examples from all over the place of women aged 65 being offered bar jobs in a nightclub or a job stacking shelves at 4 o’clock in the morning. It is just not working in practice. We need to be much more sensitive and sensible to the particular work needs of these women if they do indeed have to go back to work, and transitional arrangements cannot hold them back from doing that.

I also made the point earlier about there being just seven of these older people champions at jobcentres up and down the country. We do not need to go over the issues again. We heard them today, and we have heard them nine times before: the poor communication; the little notice or no notice of the change; the fact that women from the 1950s worked in very different environments, where they did not get equal pay or childcare benefits, or have access to occupational pension schemes, and typically worked part time. I believe if we proceed on these lines it will be a breach of trust between hundreds of thousands of women who have worked hard, brought up families and done the right thing—and some of them also have caring responsibilities—and the Government.

The state pension system is founded on the contributory principle. This is not a state benefit for which no prior commitment is involved, yet this group of women, who have been paying national insurance contributions over many years in good faith, now stand to have their reasonable expectations dashed.

I urge the Government to think again and to talk, and let us come up with a sensible proposal.