Clause 5
Pensions Bill
1:45 pm
James Purnell (Minister of State (Pensions Reform), Department for Work and Pensions; Stalybridge and Hyde, Labour)
I am glad to have clarified that. The cost of that particular amendment would be only£14 million in the first year. I think that that includes backdating, but I am not entirely sure. I shall correct that statement if it was not right.
The key issue is what the overall cost of the hon. Gentleman’s suggestion would be. He was right to say that the figure of £3 billion is the cost of reinstating what people had before and the figure of £400 million is the cost of paying everyone at the level of the basic state pension going forward from now. The hon. Gentleman tried to say that he did not think that was necessarily what should happen. I accept that he wants to control the expenditure and see if there is something that is more affordable. However, he would be creating another knock-on difficulty by doing so.
The heart of the hon. Gentleman’s argument is that there is inconsistency between people in different countries. His proposal would create inconsistency within countries so that people who had retired in Canada 20 years ago would stay on the frozen amount and people who moved from Canada after such a proposal was in place would be uprated. If not, we are back in the language of £400 million.