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Sir Norman Fowler (Sutton Coldfield): I welcome the proposals, which are fair and sensible.
There are two issues to consider--implementation and policy. On implementation, I share political responsibility with all other Ministers since 1987. However, does the right hon. Gentleman recognise that I published a White Paper in 1985-86 setting out the change to SERPS; I made a statement in the House; I introduced the Second Reading of the relevant Bill, which also had a Committee stage; and I published under my own signature a leaflet on the changes to SERPS that was distributed around the country? In no way can it be said that the legislation and proposals were slipped through.
On policy, will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that he has now accepted our policy on SERPS and widows? There can be no doubt about that. Will he also confirm that had we listened to the advice of the Labour Opposition in the mid-1980s, who fought our proposals in every respect and all the way, no savings would have come out of this policy over the next 10, 20 or 30 years?
Mr. Darling: I appreciate that the right hon. Gentleman feels obliged to try to clear his name, but let me make one point about his reign at the Department of Social Security. The Department gave the correct information for one year after the law was changed when he was Secretary of State. The problem is that although he announced widespread publicity, it never happened and the wrong information was given after 1987.
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for welcoming our proposals. It is a shame that the hon. Member for Havant could not do the same. However, that is not surprising: the right hon. Gentleman had the common sense to welcome the pension credit, which I announced two weeks ago, but the hon. Member for Havant has again shown how out of touch he is with the reality of pensions today.
Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover): Does my right hon. Friend agree that the electors knew something on 1 May when they got rid of that crowd opposite? Is he aware that in addition to the £12 billion that the Tories have cost the British people, they piled on another £5 billion with BSE and left us with a £28 billion deficit that we had to clear? All that adds up, and this Tory party has the cheek to take £4 million in Short money from the taxpayer--
Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is a bit wide of the statement.
Mr. Skinner: Will my right hon. Friend take it into account that during the next six, nine or however many months it is to general election, we should lay the blame squarely and fairly where it should be--with that lot opposite? Most of them have been to public schools and are supposed to be clever, while we members of the ordinary, common, down-to-earth working class party, have had to bail them out.
Mr. Darling: I have never been described that way before, but the general thrust of my hon. Friend's remarks
is right. The public have a right to know what Governments are doing to their pensions, and next year we are introducing an individual pension statement that will go to people so that they can see how much they will have to retire on. Had such a statement existed 14 years ago, the Tory Government would have had to tell people that they were halving SERPS entitlement.It is also an advantage that the Tories are now committed to a policy of encouraging the under-30s to opt out of the basic state pension. It is interesting that in response to a parliamentary question tabled not by a Labour Member but by a Tory, the Government Actuary revealed that it will cost 16-year-olds £10 a week just to buy back the basic state pension that the Tories want to take off them. They will know all about that in the future.
Rev. Martin Smyth (Belfast, South): On behalf of my colleagues and others, I welcome the statement. I also welcome the apology by Conservative Front Benchers and trust that Governments might be prepared to acknowledge that they make mistakes. Any human who has never made a mistake has made very little else.
I recognise that the Government are bringing together policy and organisational responsibility into a single organisation dedicated to pensioners. How will that work out in relation to the policy announced by the right hon. Gentleman in his statement? He said:
- next year, we will begin to send out combined pension statements, giving people more comprehensive information on their entitlements.
Mr. Darling: The two matters to which the hon. Gentleman refers are separate. We are bringing together the organisation and the policing-making functions of the Department of Social Security in relation to pensions, and we are doing the same thing for those of working age and children. That means that one person has end to end responsibility and we avoid the problem that was endemic in the old DSS, which had something of a Byzantine structure, where it was not clear who was responsible for what. In that way, we can ensure that, when we issue leaflets in future, or where policy is to change, the information is delivered on the ground and everyone knows about it.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the pension statement. They will start to be issued next year and they will be issued on a regular basis. Eventually, I should like people to receive them every year. That will tell them how much basic state pension they can expect, how much they will receive from their occupational or stakeholder pension, and give an indication, if they saved a little more, of how much more that would be reflected in additional pension. The idea is to ensure that people, particularly younger people who do not always think about their pensions, will have their minds focused on the fact that, if they want a decent and good income in retirement, they need to save for it. In addition, as I said earlier, if any future Conservative Government comes along and starts trying to take pensions off people, or to privatise the pension system, the public will know all about it.
Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North): Would not the most dignified way for the Opposition Front-Bench
spokesman to have responded to the Government's welcome announcement have been for him simply to apologise unreservedly for all the anxiety that the Conservative Government caused so many people in Britain--and then to sit down?
Mr. Darling: I am sure that the hon. Member for Havant will work on his dignified responses. There have not been many so far.
Mr. David Rendel (Newbury): As the person who first raised the matter with the National Audit Office, I, too, unreservedly welcome the Secretary of State's change of mind today. The second scheme that he has just announced is, without question, much better than his previous scheme and meets most, if not all, of the recommendations of the Public Administration Committee at its recent hearing. As a result of his statement, SERPS contributions that have already been made by people, whether in work or retired, now have a much higher value than they had only an hour ago. Is not some further recompense therefore also due from the Government to those who contracted out of SERPS and took out private pensions?
Mr. Darling: No, I do not think so. The measures that I have announced today will put right the injustice that occurred all those years ago, and that will be seen by most people as the right thing to do, as the hon. Gentleman also recognised. I do not propose to go further than that.
Dr. Lynne Jones (Birmingham, Selly Oak): I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement today. Did he notice that the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley), who was in his place until a few moments ago, has chosen not to respond to the statement? My right hon. Friend talks about statements being issued to pensioners, which I welcome, but will they give pensioners an indication of their likely pension when they retire, whether or not the state pension is linked to earnings or to income?
Mr. Darling: The intention is that the statements will be issued to people of working age because it is they who need to know on how much they are likely to retire. The statement will give an indication of the value of the basic state pension. For example, had the statements been in widespread use now, they would announce that pensions are going up quite dramatically next year and would also set out the effect of the pension credit. The object of the pension statement is to help people of working age form a view about how much they need to save to enjoy the standard of living to which they wish to be entitled when they retire.
Mr. John McFall (Dumbarton): As a member of the Public Administration Committee, I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on his profound statement today. I wish to comment on the sheer unalloyed cheek of the shadow Secretary of State. We have now had a disastrous hat-trick of BSE, rail privatisation and SERPS. The question on our lips is: why should the Government pick up the £12 billion bill that is the result of the previous Government's incompetence and a problem that has lasted since 1986? I remind the Secretary of State that, in evidence to the PAC, two former permanent secretaries, Sir Christopher France and
Dame Ann Bowtell, said that the Department was a shambles. The former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley), told the PAC that it was not until 1988 that he found out about a problem that had lasted for 12 years.Will my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State reassure me that information will go down to local offices, where the problem arose in the first instance, and that people on the ground will get their due rewards as a result of today's statement?
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