Clause 10 - Effect of variations under section 7(4)
State Pension Credit Bill [Lords]
5:00 pm
Ms Maria Eagle (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Minister for Disabled People), Department for Work and Pensions; Liverpool, Garston, Labour)
I apologise to the hon. Member for Canterbury if I am not speaking clearly enough. I have a bit of a throat at the moment, but will do my best to speak clearly so that he does not misunderstand what I say.
The hon. Member for Newark again raised the take-up issue. He asked how many pensioners were to have an assessed income period of five years given that there are some circumstances in which it could be shorter. We think that the vast majority of pensioners over 65 will have that assessed income period, and a small minority will have a shorter assessed income period. An example of those who may have a shorter period are those awaiting income streams on retirement, which have not yet been fixed. After they have been fixed, those people can go on to a five year assessment. We may not be able to fix an assessed income period for those with fluctuating foreign pensions. We do not know how many of them there will be until we have worked out the detail of the regulations, but we think that the number will be small.
The vast majority of pensioners will experience a claims procedure that has to happen much less frequently. They will see upratings in their retirement provision, which will happen automatically. In some cases, that may result in changes to the savings credit that people receive without them having to go through the process of filling in another form or having onerous obligations to report minuscule changes in income. From a pensioner's point of view, that experience will be less intrusive and more acceptable.
We have tried to make it easier for people to claim the minimum income guarantee; for example, we have reduced the claim form from 40 to 10 pages. We are still trying to reduce the types of forms that elderly people in particular have to fill in, because we know that that can be onerous.
Once pension credit has been introduced, we think that the experience of pensioners will be much more acceptable, and on that basis we hope to increase
take-up, if that is what puts people off from claiming entitlement. We stress that the provision is an entitlement, not a favour. We want to ensure that those who are entitled apply. I hope that I have dealt with some points that were raised.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 10 ordered to stand part of the Bill.