Lords
Oral Questions
10 March 2026
Equality Act 2010: Section 106
We can take a number of measures and, focusing on how young people generally can engage in our political process, that involves education. We had an excellent Select Committee report on precisely that issue. The noble Baroness makes a very good point about the range of people we should have in our r…
Lords
Oral Questions
5 March 2026
Access to Work Fund
I commend the noble Baroness for the really interesting and innovative work she has done in the past, and for her commitment to this area. It is always a pleasure to debate these issues with her. On value for money and the results of Access to Work, she will remember from her time in the department …
Lords
Committee Stage
2 March 2026
Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for their helpful contributions to this debate. I confess that I would miss it if we did not gather once a year to talk about the impact of this, but I will come on to that in a moment. It is always a moment, and I appreciate that, from around the House, we…
Lords
Oral Questions
26 February 2026
2 contributions
Equality and Human Rights Commission
If the noble Baronesses can be quick, we can get the Front Bench in and then the Liberal Democrats.
I repeat what I said to the noble Lord. There are many policies in existence that will obviously need to undergo review as a consequence of the Supreme Court judgment. That review will have implications, for not just sex but all the other protected characteristics. Many of these policies cover a who…
Lords
Committee Stage
23 February 2026
5 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate. I recognise that these amendments are brought forward in a spirit of good will and genuine concern, and I thank all noble Lords for that. I turn first to Amendment 212 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, and to …
My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, for bringing forward these two amendments. I hope noble Lords will forgive me if I am relatively brief. At this stage, I am not sure that there is a great deal to add beyond listening carefully to the Minister’s reply and reflecting on it.
…
+3 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
10 February 2026
2 contributions
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2026
This is neither the opportunity nor the time to have a debate on the Pensions Act 2011, but the cap on GMPs was limited to 3% because the state took over the responsibility for paying increases on private pensions in excess of 3%. However, under the coalition Government’s legislation amending pensio…
My Lords, I shall get through as many points as I can, and if I cannot, I will check Hansard and write to noble Lords. I am delighted to find that writing to members of the Committee is now a bipartisan activity, rather than just on the government side, so it is all very interesting.
I will start w…
Lords
Oral Questions
5 February 2026
Youth Unemployment
We made a commitment to equalise the 18 to 20 national minimum wage with the national living wage. We asked, as all recent Governments have done, the independent Low Pay Commission to recommend youth rates to enable us to do that, and we also included within the remit the expectation that it would c…
Lords
Committee Stage
5 February 2026
5 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, it is a pleasure to close this debate and respond to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, on his Amendment 184. I am grateful to him for raising this issue, because it goes to the heart of how we ensure that pension reform delivers better outcomes for savers rather than simply neate…
My Lords, this group concerns the proposed transfer of the AWE pension scheme into a new public sector pension arrangement, as set out after Clause 110 in government Amendments 194 to 202, with the associated measures on extent and commencement in government Amendments 223 and 224.
At first glance,…
+3 more contributions in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
4 February 2026
2 contributions
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
My Lords, it is a pleasure to open this debate on behalf of my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook.
Noble Lords from across the Grand Committee and indeed the House will be aware that the pensions Bill is currently in Committee and that the first two days of scrutiny were marked by a substantial num…
My Lords, the Government have now confirmed a substantial programme of reform of the Local Government Pension Scheme through this Bill and the wider pensions Bill. Taken together, these measures represent a significant moment in the evolution of LGPS asset pooling and governance.
Lords
Committee Stage
3 February 2026
3 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I shall speak briefly to Amendment 167, which was tabled and spoken to eloquently by the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, and supported by many noble Lords. This amendment touches on a set of concerns that we raised at Second Reading and to which we will return in considerably more detail in o…
My Lords, I speak to both Amendments 180A, tabled by my noble friend Lady Coffey, and Amendment 206, which stands in the name of my noble friend Viscount Younger of Leckie and myself. Both amendments address the regulation of pensions and how the regulation is best exercised in the interest of schem…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Proceedings
2 February 2026
Women’s State Pension Age Communication: PHSO Report
My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement, but it does not, in my view, completely address directly the issue that lies at the heart of the anger felt by many WASPI women. I am assured that the maladministration identified by the ombudsman, and the associated question of a financial…
Lords
Oral Questions
2 February 2026
Single-Sex Spaces: EHRC Guidance
I think the noble Baroness knows that I am not going to go into legal advice from the Attorney-General. This is not about whether the guidance or the draft code is compliant legally; it is to ensure that the guidance can be adopted and applied by everyone without future legal challenge. That is what…
Lords
Committee Stage
2 February 2026
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
My Lords, I thank the Benches opposite for allowing me to speak. I was trying to sort out my timing on the Statement, and I messed up there, so I thank noble Lords for their understanding.
The amendments in this group are all in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale. I agree 100% with the nob…
Lords
Oral Questions
27 January 2026
TikTok: Bereaved British Parents
The noble Baroness makes a point about the effectiveness of the regime as it stands and future developments. As I mentioned, we are looking carefully at how the regime is working currently, at the timeliness of the preservation of data, and at the communication of those steps. As she also knows, fur…
Lords
Committee Stage
26 January 2026
3 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, today’s groups build directly on the issues explored in last Thursday’s debate. That discussion was both stimulating and constructive, and the contributions made, particularly on mandation, highlight the value of the scrutiny that this Bill continues to receive in Grand Committee. On this …
My Lords, I wish to speak briefly in support of this group of amendments in the name of my noble friend Lady Altmann. She has once again demonstrated her expertise and the value that she brings to our scrutiny of these important issues. Most importantly, she explained the spirit in which these amend…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
22 January 2026
2 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, we come again to a varied group. I shall focus my remarks on the amendments in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Younger of Leckie. I welcome the contributions from other noble Lords and I look forward to the Minister’s response. We have a few amendments in this group: Amendments 50…
My Lords, again, this is a substantial group. I will not detain the Committee for too long but, before I turn to my amendments, I briefly welcome those tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann. As she set out so clearly, her amendments seek to simplify the language used in value-for-money assessme…
Lords
Oral Questions
20 January 2026
Youth Unemployment
It is obviously the case that we need to support employers to take on young people who have been unemployed for a long period, which is why we will fully fund the job opportunities for young people who have been on universal credit for 18 months. But if it were the case that only the actions of this…
Lords
Oral Questions
19 January 2026
Equality and Human Rights Commission: Code of Practice
As I have already been clear today and previously when responding to this, it is important that all bodies, public and private, consider the clarity of the For Women Scotland Supreme Court judgment and review their policies in line with that. That goes for the NHS, and it goes for other organisation…
Lords
Committee Stage
19 January 2026
3 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, when I entered the department in July 2019, defined benefit pension schemes did, on occasion, report surpluses. However, those surpluses were neither of the scale nor the character that we are now observing. If one looks back over the past quarter of a century and beyond, it is evident tha…
My Lords, we are broadly supportive of the purpose behind this amendment. It raises an important set of questions about whether members of defined benefit schemes have been given clear, timely and accessible information about state deduction or clawback provisions, and whether the rationale for thos…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Committee Stage
14 January 2026
7 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, it is a pleasure to open today’s debate on the remaining groups of amendments relating to the Local Government Pension Scheme. We are conscious that Ministers have already undertaken to write to the House on a number of points, and we do not wish to add unduly to that correspondence or set…
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate, and I also thank the Minister for his full and detailed response to the questions that were asked. The Minister talked about perhaps using these powers when there are local government reorganisations; that is highly likely in the …
+5 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
13 January 2026
Youth Guarantee Scheme: Evaluation
The noble Baroness, even when partly incapacitated, is always forthright in her questions—I wish her good luck with her recovery.
If it were the activities of this Government that were responsible for youth unemployment and the numbers of young people not earning and learning, we would not have inh…
Lords
Committee Stage
12 January 2026
3 contributions
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, we come to another group of largely probing amendments, which I welcome. A good deal of the process on the Bill will be about unpacking what the Government intend, how these provisions will work in practice and what the industry can anticipate. Certainly, those are the questions that have …
I know how frustrating it is when Members keep getting up to ask questions, but I have to do this. The Minister referred to a backstop. For what purpose? In what circumstances would it be used? Can the Minister help us understand that?
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Debate
18 December 2025
Pension Schemes Bill
My Lords, I join the Minister and the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, in saying how much I look forward to the maiden speech of the noble Baroness, Lady White, especially since I too live in Tufnell Park.
It is always a pleasure to follow the Minister. We welcome an important set of proposals f…
Lords
Oral Questions
20 November 2025
Private Equity
My Lords, as I have disclosed in the register of interests, I serve on Oxford University’s endowment investment committee, which allocates capital to private equity. There is always a risk that a debate on the role of private equity will be based on dated views of the industry, characterised by asse…