Lords
Statutory Instrument
11 February 2026
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2026
That the draft Orders laid before the House on 12 January be approved. Relevant document: 49th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee . Considered in Grand Committee on 10 February.
Lords
Committee Stage
10 February 2026
4 contributions
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2026
My Lords, in moving this order I will speak also to the draft Guaranteed Minimum Pensions Increase Order 2026. In my view, the provisions in both instruments are compatible with the European Convention on Human Rights.
I will start with the draft Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order. This instr…
My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for introducing the uprating order so clearly, and I welcome the opportunity to discuss the social security that it provides. It is a shame that it is tucked away in Grand Committee, with only a few dogged noble Lords present, given how important social…
+2 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
5 February 2026
15 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, for introducing his amendment, which would require the Government to conduct a report on the impact of consolidation in the occupational pensions sector within 12 months of the Act being passed. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, f…
My Lords, the Government recognise that the pension compensation system and the safety net it offers need to work harder for members. Payments from the Pension Protection Fund, the PPF, and the Financial Assistance Scheme, FAS, based on pensions built up before 1997, do not get uprated with inflatio…
+13 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
3 February 2026
9 contributions
Child Poverty: Faith-based and Voluntary Sector Organisations
I thank the Minister for her Answer. I know she is deeply aware that faith communities play a vital role in supporting children and families. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Derby was grateful for her visit last year, and I look forward very much to her forthcoming visit to Grimsby. However…
My Lords, the right reverend Prelate is right to raise the role of faith-based organisations, but I wonder if the Minister is aware of the role of cultural organisations and cultural participation in reducing the impacts of child poverty. I think of personal and social networks, employability skills…
+7 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
3 February 2026
8 contributions
Two-child Benefit Cap: Foreign-born Children
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer. I agree that the public do support the safety net of welfare, provided that it is targeted and fair, and goes to British people rather than migrants to the country. However, the Government’s own data shows that fewer than 1% of those who will benefit f…
This somewhat xenophobic Question concerns increased spending as a result of abolishing the two-child limit, which even the noble Lord, Lord Freud, who introduced it, described as “vicious”. Could my noble friend the Minister perhaps remind us of the cost of not abolishing the cap, in respect of how…
+6 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
3 February 2026
17 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, these amendments, debated in the last session, concern trustees’ duties and protections, the design of the savers’ interest test, the risk of regulatory herding and the proportionality of the penalty regime.
I start with the operation of the savers’ interest test and exemptions for many f…
My Lords, I am not going to say any more than I have now. The noble Baroness has made a series of complaints about cartels, secrecy and lack of integrity—all kinds of things—none of which are merited. I simply felt that I needed to put something on the record to counter that, and I do not have anyth…
+15 more contributions in this session
Lords
Proceedings
2 February 2026
7 contributions
Women’s State Pension Age Communication: PHSO Report
My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their questions. Last November, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions told Parliament that the Government would make a new decision in response to the ombudsman’s findings on state pension-age communications. That followed relevant evidence comi…
My Lords, I do not. I will try to explain. We accept the PHSO’s—the ombudsman’s—findings on maladministration, but we specifically do not agree with the ombudsman’s approach to injustice. The reason for that is that the evidence taken as a whole, including the evidence from 2007, suggests that the m…
+5 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
26 January 2026
11 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
I am grateful to noble Lords who have introduced and spoken to amendments. Clause 40 delivers the Government’s commitment to ensure that DC workplace pension savers benefit from the advantages that flow from scale and consolidation. It establishes a clear, measurable threshold and a framework centre…
My Lords, I made these arguments at some length on Thursday. I have made them again now. The noble Lord disagrees with them; I can tell from his tone. He can read Hansard and pick up the relevant bits with me if he would like to.
Let me come back to the amendments. I will start with Amendments 91 a…
+9 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
22 January 2026
18 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for introducing their amendments and for the debate that followed. The amendments rightly seek an assurance that the VFM framework is strong and effective and they try to clarify how it will take account of a range of important factors that can affect the v…
My Lords, I again thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Altmann and Lady Stedman-Scott, and all noble Lords who have spoken. Let me start with the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann. I completely appreciate her desire to make the VFM framework easier for everybody to understand. I recognise…
+16 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
20 January 2026
10 contributions
Parental Leave and Pay Review
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that Answer, but does she accept that the case for change is urgent? Most forms of parental leave are unpaid or pitifully low paid: £187 a week equates to less than half the national minimum wage, and many mums and dads and partners simply cannot afford to take …
My Lords, the Minister referred to the call for evidence, which closed in August. I appreciate that there were around 1,300 responses, but it has been five months since then, with not a word of an update from the Government. Could we get an update from the Minister now on progress in that last five …
+8 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
19 January 2026
10 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Davies of Brixton and the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, for explaining their amendments, and to all noble Lords, who have spoken so concisely—we positively cantered through that group; may that continue throughout the day.
It is worth saying a w…
I am coming on to that, but I am grateful to the noble Lord for pressing me on it. All trustees are bound by duties which will continue to apply when making decisions on sharing surplus. They have to comply with the rules of the scheme and with legal requirements, including a duty to act in the inte…
+8 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
12 January 2026
4 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, for introducing his amendment, and all noble Lords who have spoken. It is a particular delight to hear from so many colleagues so early in Committee.
I should begin by saying two things. First, I am a member of the parliamentary pension s…
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, for introducing his amendments, and to all noble Lords who have spoken. This gives us an opportunity to talk about how best to balance the way we structure matters between primary and secondary legislation. However, the proposals from the nobl…
+2 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
6 January 2026
7 contributions
Graduate Jobs
My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for her Answer and agree with many of the points she has made. For a number of decades now, Governments of all shades have encouraged school leavers to go to university. I did not. I attended one of the old technical colleges, Dundee Institute of Techno…
My Lords, instead of finding jobs for graduates, we should be trying to persuade more 18 year-olds not to go to university. In the colleges that I support, 25% of our leavers become apprentices compared to 4% from an ordinary school. Apprentices can earn as much as £30,000 a year at the age of 18. M…
+5 more contributions in this session
Lords
Debate
18 December 2025
5 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, it is a privilege to open the Second Reading of the Pension Schemes Bill. I am grateful to noble Lords for the engagement we have already had, and I look forward to working constructively together as the Bill progresses through this House. I also very much look forward to the maiden speech…
My Lords, I too look forward to the maiden speech of the noble Baroness, Lady White. I have every confidence that she will make a great contribution, including to the work of the House generally. Having had some interface with her at the DWP, I am very confident that will happen.
Although the Bill …
+3 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
18 December 2025
8 contributions
Jobs Market: Wider Economic Implications
The Minister omitted to mention that unemployment has now risen to 1,830,000 and, perhaps most chilling of all, that the number of young people without the dignity of work has risen to 735,000. Do the Government now accept that the triple blow of the jobs tax in last year’s Budget, the increased inc…
My Lords, I call on the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, who is participating remotely.
+6 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
17 December 2025
8 contributions
Employment Gap for Blind and Sight-impaired People
My Lords, if you are blind or sight impaired, in the UK currently the employment rate is just 27%. If you are not disabled, it is 83%. Therefore, if you are sight impaired you have only around a one in four chance of being in work. This cannot continue. Will the Minister strongly consider establishi…
My Lords, the Minister acknowledges the sight-loss employment gap. How many full-time equivalent disability employment advisers are employed by the DWP—and do all DEAs have specific sight-loss training? Do access to work assessors and jobcentre staff have sight-loss training and, if they do not, wil…
+6 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
10 December 2025
9 contributions
Universal Credit: Two-child Limit
My Lords, recent international evidence found that unconditional cash transfers increase fertility. Families claiming health-related benefits are not capped, so even these workless families will get UC for every child, again affecting work incentives. Research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies fou…
My Lords, academic research has found that the two-child limit had no positive employment effect and that parents living in poverty are pushed further from the labour market because of stress, insecurity and the sheer hard work of struggling to get by. Does my noble friend therefore agree that a dec…
+7 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
18 November 2025
9 contributions
Carer’s Allowance: Overpayments Review
I thank my noble friend for that response. I trust that I can feel hopeful about it and that, when the government response comes, it will be both positive and compassionate. I hope she will agree that the most important thing we have to avoid in future is prosecution of carers and the great distress…
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reassurance, and we will of course wait for the independent review. In the meantime, what steps are the Government taking to ensure that carers are not unfairly penalised for minor or unintentional breaches of earnings rules? Will they consider writing off his…
+7 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
13 November 2025
10 contributions
Jobs Market
My Lords, there are now nearly 2 million unemployed people on this Government’s watch and the number is rising month by month since the introduction of the penal national insurance job tax and now the threat of first-day unfair dismissal rights under the Employment Rights Bill. Will the Minister lis…
My Lords, can the Minister outline what assessment has been made of the dual impact of artificial intelligence on the UK job market, in both the potential for job displacement in some sectors and the creation of new roles? What is the Government’s strategy to manage this transition and equip the Bri…
+8 more contributions in this session
Lords
Debate
11 November 2025
6 contributions
Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her constructive approach. It has not always answered all the questions but it has gone a long way towards that. I put on record our thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, for his constructive initiatives on which some of these amendments are based, and to the noble …
My Lords, as we come to this final group of government amendments on the DWP section of the Bill, I begin by recognising the real progress that has been made on the DWP use of PACE powers and eligibility verification provisions—progress that has been driven by this House’s detailed scrutiny and the …
+4 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
28 October 2025
7 contributions
People with Disabilities: Employment
I thank the Minister for her response, but the fact remains that only 5% of people with learning disabilities are in paid employment. Will the Minister agree to giving businesses an exemption or a remission from the employers’ national insurance contribution for this cohort, whose lives would be tra…
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Monckton, for her important Question. I declare my interest as having a 46 year-old son with a learning disability and autism. I am currently mentoring a highly educated 38 year-old young man, who has four degrees, including a master’s and a PhD. He still c…
+5 more contributions in this session
Lords
Debate
23 October 2025
3 contributions
Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill
My Lords, it has been a privilege for my noble friend Lady Anderson and me to take this important Bill through the House. This Government are committed to safeguarding public money and tackling fraud and waste. Public sector fraud is not a victimless crime; it damages our public services and, ultima…
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her remarks. I will make a short reflection on our discussions on Report and in Committee. I speak for my noble friend Lady Finn in so doing. Despite the technical title, this is an important Bill, as the noble Baroness said. It addresses one of the most serious pr…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
23 October 2025
7 contributions
Jobcentres: Staffing Levels
I thank the Minister for her response. A recent BBC article suggested that capacity has been created in jobcentres only by reducing the number and length of appointments. One work coach they spoke to said that having only 10 minutes with clients means
“you’re just being a benefits policeman”,
and …
My Lords, during my time as an MP, I made a point of trying to visit local jobcentres every year on a very regular basis. One of my consistent observations was that, all too often, local offices were never properly involved in designing services to address local priorities. So, is it not time we got…
+5 more contributions in this session