State Pension Age: Women

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Ian Blackford

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford]

I am stunned. [Interruption.] I am speechless, because we should put that out in a leaflet. We are not talking about tea and sympathy; we are talking about WASPI women having to rely on benefits, and they are going to get nothing from the hon. Gentleman—that is crystal clear. It is obvious where he stands on this issue.

Today, these Tories should deliver the generational fairness they promised in their manifesto. I sincerely welcome the backing of some 37 Conservative MPs who expressed support for WASPI women during the general election—37 Tory MPs signed the pledge. We will be watching this afternoon, as will the WASPI women, and these MPs will be expected to do what they promised in the election campaign and stand up for the WASPI women. That support stretches from the Tory Back Benches across to the Benches of the Democratic Unionist party—to our friends from the DUP. Page 9 of the DUP manifesto contained a pledge to protect pensions, with the announcement that the DUP would:

“Support an end to the unfair treatment of women pensioners”.

I call on DUP Members to deliver on their pledges made to the WASPI women.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I am disappointed at the tone that has been set in this debate. Despite the fact that we have a motion that could command widespread support, the tone of the debate has not been as I expected. Let me make something clear: we made a manifesto pledge on this issue, and the reason why I am here as my party’s spokesman is that we do support this and we will go through the Lobby on it. However, the WASPI women would be better served if we had a debate that was not divisive and not about point scoring, because there is no party—whether Labour, the Liberals or the Conservatives—that has not caused some of this problem.

[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful that DUP Members will be going through the Lobby, but let me point out that we are trying to set out the facts of the arguments in this House. These women have for too long been let down by politicians, so let us use the opportunity we have today to give them the result they deserve. Thanks to freedom of information requests, we learned that the Department for Work and Pensions only began writing to women born between April 1950 and April 1955 in April 2009, and did not complete the process until February 2012. So it was writing to women to inform them about changes in legislation that go back to 1995 but it did not start the formal notification period for 14 years. Taking 14 years to begin informing women that a pension they had paid into was being deferred is quite something. Can we imagine the outcry if a private pension provider was behaving in such a way? There would be an outcry in this House and, no doubt, legal action. When we consider that entitlement to a state pension is earned through national insurance contributions, where many women have made contributions over 40 years, this is stunning.

A woman born on 6 April 1953 who, under the previous legislation, would have retired on 6 April 2013 would have received a letter from the DWP in January 2012 with the bombshell that she would not be retiring then—she would be retiring in July 2016. That is three years and three months later than she might have expected, and this is with 15 months’ notice. That is what Conservative Members have been defending, and it is no wonder the WASPI women are insulted. We are talking about 15 months’ notice before what they thought was a contract they had with the Government was simply to be ripped up.

A pensions White Paper published in December 1993 stated:

“In developing its proposals for implementing the change the Government has paid particular attention to the need to give people enough time to plan ahead and to phase the change in gradually”.

Not much there that I would disagree with, but when you accept the need for people to plan ahead, you need to write to them and tell them.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Ian Blackford

Tuesday 31st January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Lady leads me neatly on to my next point.

When I campaigned in the referendum, I campaigned as a Member of the UK Parliament, which passed a law for a referendum that had national implications and would be judged on a national basis, not on a narrow regional basis of Northern Ireland having a different say from the rest of the people of the United Kingdom. I would have thought that as a Unionist the hon. Lady would respect the fact that this was a UK referendum and therefore the outcome had to be judged on a UK basis. It would be detrimental to the Union if Northern Ireland—or Scotland or Wales—had the right to say to the people of the whole of the United Kingdom, “We don’t care how you voted. The 1.8 million people in Northern Ireland have a right to veto how the rest of the people in the United Kingdom expressed their view.” I therefore would not accept that that could be the case.

[Ian Blackford]

We are not seeking to impose a veto on the people of the United Kingdom. The people of the United Kingdom have voted to leave, and we respect that. We have asked that Westminster respect our situation of having voted to remain, as one of the family of nations. Why will the UK Government not support our right to remain within the single market?

[Sammy Wilson]

Of course, it depends on how you dress up that request.

The Government have made it clear that they want to hear about the concerns and issues that affect not just Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, but other regions of England, and particular industries as well. Indeed, they have set up mechanisms to do so. There are numerous conversations and discussions between officials within Departments. There is the Joint Ministerial Committee where politicians from the different countries that make up the United Kingdom can express their views. There are ministerial meetings. Not only that, but in the case of Northern Ireland the Government have made a commitment—

Tax Credits (Working Families)

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Ian Blackford

Tuesday 7th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford]

I must tell the hon. Gentleman that according to the figures released two weeks ago, child poverty in Scotland is up by 20,000. That is the reality of what his Government have done to people in my country.

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Gentleman made a point about quantitative easing. Does he accept that one of the problems identified was the lack of bank lending to industry, and that banks needed liquidity to increase lending to businesses?

[Ian Blackford]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question, because we need a debate about that in the House. The real reason behind quantitative easing was exactly that—to produce an increase in bank lending—but if we look at what has happened over the past five or six years, we can see that there has hardly been a significant increase in bank lending. The money has gone into the financial markets and benefited the banks and the bankers, but we as a country have not seen the benefits that we should have had. That is the reality of what has happened. The previous Government had the choice between investing in the real economy and sticking cash into the back pockets of the bankers, which is what they achieved.

Why do the Government not invest in growing the economy and supporting low-paid workers, rather than punishing them for the Government’s failure to deliver sustainable economic growth?