Public Service Pensions Bill

Part of Business of the House – in the House of Commons at 5:53 pm on 29 October 2012.

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Photo of Rachel Reeves Rachel Reeves Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury 5:53, 29 October 2012

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. We also believe that this Bill should not pre-empt or cut across ongoing discussions—this builds on the point that he raised, as my right hon. Friend Mr Barron has done—between the Department of Health, NHS employers and NHS workers about the implications of working longer for some staff groups, especially those, such as paramedics, in physically demanding roles.

We think that the Bill should reflect Lord Hutton’s recommendations that the link between public service pension ages and the state pension age should be kept under review and that this should be conducted by a properly independent body, with public service employees and employers represented and consulted. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury said in his speech that that will happen, but it is not guaranteed in the Bill—indeed, it is unclear whether it is even compatible with the Bill. These are all issues that we will be raising in Committee to get the commitments that public service workers deserve and thought they had been given during the negotiations behind the Bill. These are also issues that we will have in mind as we look to any future increases in the state pension age itself.

For our finances to be sustainable, and for decent pensions to be affordable, it is right that retirement ages rise with longevity. However, as Malcolm Wicks, the late Member for Croydon North reminded us in some of his most recent work, many people doing manual jobs started work at 16 or 18, with some doing so even earlier, and find it harder to continue work into their late 60s. We should be mindful of people’s capacity to work later and later, especially if support is not in place for them in the workplace.

Secondly, there are real worries that the Bill fails to take due account of the special characteristics of the local government pension scheme. Members will know that it is a fully funded scheme administered by local authorities and we should welcome the hard work of local councils and trade unions, who have made very valuable progress in negotiations on a mutually agreeable agenda for reform. The Bill threatens to unravel the agreements that have been reached and destabilise financially the local government pension funds by forcing a disruptive and potentially disastrous closure of existing schemes instead of facilitating a smooth transition to the new scheme design. That extension of Treasury interference into aspects of scheme valuation and design could prevent local authorities from delivering on the deal they have agreed with their work force. Indeed, the view of the pensions manager at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy is that the relevant provisions in the Bill represent

“a major shift in the governance of local authority pensions and” raise

“questions about future local democratic accountability for those pension funds.”

Again, we expect those concerns to be addressed in Committee.

Thirdly, on the question of good governance, the Bill must underpin and not undermine high standards of scheme governance. As Lord Hutton stated in his final report,

“there is a powerful case for…much stronger governance of all the public service pension schemes. This should keep government, taxpayers and scheme members better informed about the financial health of these schemes. There should be minimum standards set for scheme administration. There is also a proper and legitimate role for representatives of the workforce to be formally involved in these new governance arrangements.”

The Bill fails to include key recommendations from Lord Hutton’s report, such as the inclusion of member-nominated and independent members on pension boards; the establishment of pension policy groups to consider major changes to scheme rules; the need to ensure that pension boards are responsible for the oversight of financial management and, in the case of funded schemes such as the local government pension scheme, for investment management; and the commissioning of a review into how standards of administration in public service pension schemes can be improved. Those measures would improve the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of scheme administration and would ensure that public service pension schemes matched best practice in the private sector.

Finally, we must ensure that the Bill adequately reflects and reinforces the progress made in negotiations. We should give public service workers a system they can trust and pensions that they can save towards with confidence, ensuring protection against retrospective or arbitrary detrimental changes. We also have concerns in this regard, which some hon. Members have already mentioned, and we will seek to address them in Committee. For one thing, the Bill subjects many aspects of public service pension provision to unilateral Treasury control. Although it is right that mechanisms should be in place to ensure that costs to taxpayers are contained, public service employees also have a right to know that critical changes will be consulted on and that their pension savings will not be vulnerable to arbitrary interference and opportunistic cash raids.

Furthermore, Lord Hutton has stated that

“there must…be full protection of accrued rights”,

but the Bill does not rule out retrospective changes that reduce benefits already accrued, going against the fundamental principle that pension benefits accrued are pay deferred and must therefore be honoured. The Government have reiterated their commitment to maintaining defined benefits in the public sector, and the Chief Secretary reaffirmed that to the House last year. He said, as he has on a number of other occasions, that his commitment was that

“public sector schemes will remain as defined benefit schemes, with a guaranteed amount provided in retirement”.—[Hansard, 2 November 2011; Vol. 534, c. 927.]

Clause 7, however, provides for the creation of new schemes that are

“defined benefits…defined contributions…or…a scheme of any other description.”

That should not be a means to drive a coach and horses through the commitments the Government have given and allow another round in the race to the bottom on pension provision.

In addition, the Government have made much of their promise of

“no more reform for 25 years”.

In his foreword to the Treasury’s document on new scheme designs, published last December, the Chief Secretary wrote that

“we need a long term solution that will last a generation”.

Clause 20 specifies “protected elements” of scheme design that cannot be altered for the next 25 years without clearing a “high hurdle” of comprehensive consultation and a report to parliament.

We think it is right that public service workers should be given an assurance that their pension savings will not be vulnerable to further arbitrary and unfair changes without adequate scrutiny and debate, but the Bill seems to be riddled with loopholes, excluding a number of important scheme features from the list of “protected elements” and stating that the “high hurdle” can be bypassed in order to meet a cost cap that is in turn set by the Treasury with no such requirement for consultation and report. Furthermore, it was a critical part of the agreements reached with employee representatives that protection should be provided to staff transferred to alternative providers as a result of public service outsourcing —the so-called fair deal policy. The Chief Secretary told the House last year that

“we have agreed to retain the fair deal provision and extend access for transferring staff. The new pensions will be substantially more affordable to alternative providers, and it is right that we offer workers continued access to them.”—[Hansard, 20 December 2011; Vol. 537, c. 1203.]

Yet there is no guarantee in the Bill that public service workers transferred to new employers will be able to keep their public service pensions. We will seek to address all those issues in Committee to improve the Bill and the protections granted to public service workers.

In conclusion, we think public service workers with understandable fears for their financial futures deserve better than being treated as pawns in this Government’s political games, with the consequence that it has been harder to reach agreement on reasonable reforms that control costs to the taxpayer. Indeed, perhaps the best case for the Bill is that it should ensure that never again can an opportunistic Government create unnecessary conflict and disruption by imposing unfair and arbitrary changes without adequate consultation, scrutiny and accountability. Let us ensure that it fulfils that objective.

Finally, let us remember that the real pensions crisis is not in the public sector but in the private sector. It is right that we should ensure public service pensions are sustainable and affordable for the taxpayer, but we should not allow that to distract us from the unacceptable inadequacy of pension provision in the private sector. Too often, it has sounded as though the Government’s answer to disparities in pension provision across the public and private sectors is to level down, not level up. Indeed, we have seen more than a million lower paid workers excluded from automatic enrolment when we should be ensuring that the National Employment Savings Trust can deliver low-cost, high-quality pensions to all who could benefit.