Restriction on public sector exit payments

Part of Enterprise Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee at 3:45 pm on 23 February 2016.

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Photo of Kevin Brennan Kevin Brennan Shadow Minister (Business, Innovation and Skills) 3:45, 23 February 2016

My hon. Friend’s astute intervention saves me from going into too much detail on that score, but she is absolutely right: we simply do not know the equality implications of the measures, particularly in regard to gender, because the Government have not supplied us with the figures. It seems intuitively highly likely that the impact will be skewed heavily against female workers in the sorts of occupation that she outlined and perhaps in other public sector occupations.

The Bill, as it stands, does not have any such exemption as the Treasury Minister indicated it would last year. As far as I can make out, that was not the initial intention or, indeed, what was stated in the Conservative party manifesto. Despite the Government’s arguments, while the public sector exit payment cap includes pension entitlement within its scope—that is a key issue—it will affect employees on even lower salaries, as current pension protections wither on the vine.