Tom Greatrex
Main Page: Tom Greatrex (Labour (Co-op) - Rutherglen and Hamilton West)Department Debates - View all Tom Greatrex's debates with the HM Treasury
(14 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr Mark Hoban)
My hon. Friend makes an important point. A large number of Equitable Life policyholders are very angry about how they were treated by the previous Government. We have committed to setting up an independent, fair and transparent payments scheme, further information on which will be presented to the House later this month.
Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
The Economic Secretary, the Chief Secretary’s Front-Bench colleague, referred to the establishment of the Office for Budget Responsibility as a welcome step forward for transparency. In the interests of transparency, could the Chief Secretary tell me precisely when he saw the revised unemployment figures produced by the OBR?
Danny Alexander
The revised unemployment figures were published by the OBR on the Wednesday morning. The figures were circulated in the normal way, as happens with the Office for National Statistics, the day before in the Treasury. That is when I saw the documentation that was published. The requirements for confidentiality that apply to ONS figures also apply to OBR figures.