Sir John Hayes

I am extremely grateful for your indulgence and generosity, Dr Huq. I wish to speak because I have enjoyed correspondence with the Minister at the Treasury Bench on exactly this subject on behalf of constituents who have written to me. Not only has he replied to me to address the concerns of my constituents, but so have his ministerial colleagues in the Treasury—such is the volume of my correspondence that it is too much for him alone to handle. It reflects the widespread concern among my constituents about the freezing of thresholds and the effect on pensioners, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Alison Griffiths) has so admirably and ably highlighted. At the heart of this matter is a fundamental principle, which is that we owe a particular and special debt to those who have given a lifetime’s work to this nation. That is why a previous Government introduced what is known as the triple lock. I need not rehearse the argument for it at length today, except to say that in my judgment it is entirely legitimate and justified. Once it has been promised, it cannot be taken away—that is the political reality—but it has pushed more and more pensioners into taxation as thresholds have been frozen. Each year, more pensioners pay tax who should never have paid tax at all. That is not an entirely new phenomenon: I remember my father, who had a small works pension, paying tax in his 80s. He has been dead for more than 20 years, but he said to me then, “I am 85 and still paying tax. Is that really appropriate?” My answer then, like my answer now, was no. It is not appropriate for people on relatively modest incomes to be drawn into tax because of the freezing of thresholds. I endorse entirely what my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton said, but—with your further indulgence, Dr Huq—I want to make two other points. I want to make a case, as I have before in this very Chamber, for the WASPI women. Those women were caught out by a change in the provision of pensions due to an alteration in the age at which women retired. They have suffered an injustice; that is not just my consideration or judgment, but that of the ombudsman, who accused the Government of maladministration. Those women, too, deserve a hearing. Before you call me to order, Dr Huq, and tell me that I am digressing from the subject at hand—