Stephen Timms: The reforms described in the pensions Green Paper published on 15 December should raise the incentives to voluntary saving through better-quality, better-value second pensions and restructured state support.
Stephen Timms: My hon. Friend is right. There has long been a need for the changes that we have proposed. For far too many people, a good-value funded pension—or one that they can access on reasonable terms—is not available, and they are exactly the people at whom the stakeholder pension is aimed. We are committed to ensuring that everybody who can afford to save for retirement should have every...
Stephen Timms: The hon. Gentleman is mistaken. The aim of the framework proposals is that those who are able to save should do so, but that there should be security for those who are not able to save. The state second pension is a 100 per cent. contributory scheme which will ensure that everyone who has worked and contributed throughout his or her life will retire on an income above the minimum income...
Stephen Timms: My hon. Friend is right. The state second pension will provide modernised support for people on low incomes, and will double the accrual rate on the state pension for people on £9,000 a year. It will treat people on incomes below that level as if they had been earning £9,000 a year throughout their working lives. That will be done on the basis of the existing 4.6 per cent. state...
Stephen Timms: The whole House will have enjoyed this speech by the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies). It was a bravura performance delivered with the verve and gusto that we associate with the hon. Gentleman and that we all enjoy—but that might also be described kindly as displaying a light grasp of the details of the Government's proposals. I first became aware of the hon. Gentleman's...
Stephen Timms: We have been absolutely frank about what has been happening throughout this process. We have been picking up the pieces and sorting out the problems that we inherited from the previous Government. I wish to comment about another issue that was picked up frequently in the debate.
Stephen Timms: No, no. [Interruption.] I have read the report. The fact is that the system of commission had to be operational by February 1997, but parts of it are becoming operational only now. We have had to sort out the mess. I want to comment on an issue that a number of hon. Members have mentioned, and of which the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford makes much—means-testing. The state second...
Stephen Timms: No. What the document says is absolutely right. Of course group personal pensions will not qualify as stakeholder pensions; they are personal pensions—they are different. I repeat the point that I have made to the hon. Gentleman: nothing in the document will make it any more difficult to provide a group personal pension than it is today. Our proposals in the Green Paper are based on the...
Stephen Timms: I cannot. Time is running short and I apologise to the hon. Lady. People who have worked and paid contributions throughout their working lives would go straight on to income support. That would be the case for people earning less than £15,000 a year even if they had been in the state earnings-related pension scheme throughout their working lives. How can we instead ensure that people who...
Stephen Timms: The benefit integrity project will be replaced by a new system of review which will be sensitive to people's circumstances and fair, as it will provide for awards to be increased as well as decreased in line with entitlement. We shall introduce the new system as soon as possible and expect to have it in place by April at the latest. Our priority is not to rush the change, but rather to...
Stephen Timms: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his congratulations. We shall end the benefit integrity project as soon as we have a replacement that is acceptable. The Social Security Committee, which is chaired by the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood), has done some excellent work on the subject and has suggested—rightly, in my view—that the Department should be much more active...
Stephen Timms: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his congratulations and also for drawing attention to the widespread support for the Government's announcement ending the benefit integrity project. I can confirm that the emphasis of the new system will be on correctness—on making sure that the benefit paid is correct at the outset, and that it continues to be maintained correctly thereafter. That means...
Stephen Timms: I thank the hon. Lady for that part of her question which was good wishes and welcome. She makes a fair point that, under the arrangements put in place by the previous Government for the benefit integrity project, many reductions in benefit were overturned on appeal. I am pleased to tell her, however, that the rate of appeals that are upheld has consistently increased because of the steps...
Stephen Timms: My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the importance and sensitivity of those matters. We must ensure that we get them right. We undoubtedly need to introduce improvements in information technology and the Accord programme—the access to corporate data procurement project—on which we have embarked will enable us to do that. I am confident that increasingly we shall be able to offer the...
Stephen Timms: I should be happy to write to the hon. Lady with those figures, which have been published and are readily available. I agree about the importance of training, and we are paying great attention to training for the new system. I am confident that we shall have the resources that we need to get that right so that our checking system commands widespread support, not least among disabled people...
Stephen Timms: We have reduced VAT on fuel and introduced winter fuel payments to help pensioners with their heaviest quarterly fuel bill. As my right hon. Friend has said, we announced last month in the pensions Green Paper that, from April, we will introduce a new minimum income guarantee for pensioners of at least £75 a week for single people and £116.60 for couples.
Stephen Timms: I can reassure the hon. Gentleman about the Government's commitment. We made it absolutely clear in our manifesto that we would give priority to the poorest pensioners because that is the group which requires the most urgent action. The minimum income guarantee allows us to concentrate the extra help on those pensioners and offers to those on income support a substantial increase in their...
Stephen Timms: It will be provided within the state second pension. We have proposed that carers will be credited with contributions so that, in effect, they will gain about £1 a week in pension for each year of caring that they undertake. It will not be a funded scheme, but it is a huge step forward for carers, which has been widely welcomed and is long overdue.
Stephen Timms: I enjoyed that question. I am rateful to the hon. Gentleman for his congratulations on behalf of those on the Opposition Front Bench and I can reassure him that the progress that we are making is not as a result of pressure from him and his colleagues, although it is substantial. We acknowledged in the Green Paper that, under the present system, some of those who qualify for the minimum...
Stephen Timms: We have no record of any recent representations to the Department principally about fuel poverty among the elderly, but, since January 1998, we have received 439 letters about winter fuel payments.