John Glen – impassioned on pensions in Westminster Hall
How pensions are treated in parliament is set out admirably by William Wright. I cannot remember intensity of debate on pensions like we’re doing and it’s not just around show-pieces like the Budget and the readings of the Pension Schemes Bill. Politics is not everything but it’s a debate by people who represent us. John Glen is MP for Salisbury as well as a former Minister in the Treasury, Richard Tice is outspoken as Reform is; Reform reflects the current mood of more of us than any other party. The Liberals are taking an interest in pensions, I haven’t seen since Steve Webb departed the Chamber in 2016
I do not hear an argument against fiduciary intervention through mandation. Steve Darling, the Liberal spokesperson remarks upon the danger of loss of liberty (a very liberal thought) but I do not get a general aversion to what Bell is proposing in the Bill.
Sometimes we underestimate the notion of ” a nation” and think that what people are saying is what we are told in our conference halls. I am more interested by what is being said in parliament and the extent to which it reflects what ordinary people think.
There are a lot of reasons people have to be angry with what has or hasn’t happened in terms of implementing promises. But I do not think that pensions is an area that ordinary people feel hard done by. It’s the extraordinary people, those with superfluous wealth who have lost out since July 2024.