New clause 1 - Advice
State Pension Credit Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Professor Steve Webb (Northavon, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
We tabled the new clause to give the Committee an opportunity to probe the Government about their intentions with regard to the Pension Service. Our central tenet is that the pension credit is a complicated benefit, so pensioners will need a lot of easily accessible and good advice. The new clause sets out some of the criteria by which we might judge whether the service provided to pensioners is good enough.
We suggest that there should be regulations, setting out the quality and type of service that people who want to know about pension credit can expect to receive. Subsection (2) lists some of the features of what we would consider to be decent standards of advice. Paragraph (a) suggests that advice should be available ''face-to-face''. It is not meant to undermine the Minister's assertion that pensioners want the option of contacting the Department by telephone or that many would find it more convenient. We do not have a problem with that. We want to ensure choice. The telephone is great, if that is what pensioners want to use, as is the internet. However, we believe that there should be a statement of their entitlement to ask for advice face to face. It has been suggested that face-to-face advice will be available, but it would help if we had a little more clarity about that.
We have listed further qualifications under paragraphs (b), (c) and (d). Paragraph (b) provides that the advice should be given by a ''suitably qualified person''. At the moment, pensioners who are unsure about pension entitlements and income support can go to the Benefits Agency office because, somewhere in the building, there will be someone who understands pensions. The division between Jobcentre Plus, which is for people of working age, and the Pension Service, which is for people of pensionable age, will result in the number of people in the Benefits Agency who
know about pensions diminishing to nil. For the first year or two, pensioners will be told, ''Fred in the back office, who used to work in pensions, will know something about it. Go and see him.'' My worry is that in five years' time, once that segmentation has taken place, and because those who want an immediate face-to-face interview will have to go to a Benefits Agency or Jobcentre Plus office, such expert advice will no longer be available.
Paragraph (c) is about home visits. We have been given assurances by the Minister that people will be able to have a home visit if appropriate. On the face of it, that is excellent news. Some of the people involved are very frail and elderly, and may be disabled, and a home visit would be the best and only way to help them. However, it is not clear—again, it would help if the Minister could place it on the record—how absolute is the right to a home visit. We cannot have 5 million of 10 million home visits; it would not be practical. Will all those who say, ''I'd like you to come to me,'' get a home visit? Will they have to satisfy a disability test or a test of competence? Will discretion be allowed?
One can imagine a constituent telephoning the constituency office and saying, ''I want someone from the Department for Work and Pensions to come and see me about pension credit.'' However, the answer may be, ''I am sorry, but we don't have enough people to make all those house calls. You will have to come to us because you are obviously fit enough and well enough to do so.'' What will be the nature of the entitlement? Will people be entitled to a home visit, or will it be done at the service's discretion? How pushy can pensioners be if they are told that the office is fully booked for the next few weeks and that they need to visit the office?
Paragraph (c) mentions also a ''reasonable travelling distance''. The danger is that although the Department might say that pensioners could be given advice face to face, it might be available only at major regional centres. For those living in rural areas, a requirement to go to a city centre might not be good enough. The Minister has said that face-to-face advice will be available, but how far will people have to travel to get it?