Oral Answers to Questions

Ronnie Campbell Excerpts

Monday 10th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

14. When he next plans to meet firefighters to discuss their pensions.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

18. What progress his Department has made on resolving the dispute over firefighters’ pensions.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Penny Mordaunt)]

After extensive consultation and numerous changes, the Government laid the final regulations before Parliament on 28 October. They provide one of the best schemes in the public sector. I regularly meet firefighters and will continue to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Penny Mordaunt]

What the right hon. Gentleman says is not correct; Wales and Northern Ireland have made no announcements on fitness. We are currently consulting on doing what Scotland has done through a regulation, which would offer firefighters those protections —we have to do that through a statutory instrument because we do not have one single fire authority for England. In addition, we are the only nation that has set up a working group on fitness to ensure good practice among all our fire authorities.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell]

I worked down the coal mine for 29 years, and I watched old men of 60 struggling at the coal face. What must it be like for firemen of 60 trying to save lives from fire and flood?

[Penny Mordaunt]

As I said earlier, it was Labour that introduced the retirement age at 60, but this is an issue that I—[Interruption.] I have to say that I take great offence, particularly at some of the paid-for advertising that has been run in local newspapers, which has been incredibly patronising towards older workers. We need older workers to stay in the fire service because they have great expertise. By offering protections on pensions and jobs for older workers and good practice for fire authorities to follow, we will ensure that in future they have the protections that Labour did not introduce.