Lewis Atkinson MP: speeches

Speeches

• 12 May 2025 · Income Tax: Personal Allowance · Hansard source

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  I thank the right hon. Lady for that intervention. Of course, it was the previous Government who harmonised the income tax thresholds for pensioners and those of working age alike, the situation having previously been different. I absolutely recognise the stress felt by pensioners around the land. That is why such a debate is difficult without wider consideration of pension incomes and in particular the maintenance of the triple lock, which is not the subject of this debate, but which strikes me as important to consider. As I was saying, there is a disparity between the potential benefits of a significant increase in the personal allowance for those with different levels of income, with those earning the most benefiting the most from such an increase. Members may also wish to know that there would also be significant geographic differences in the impact of any changes. The places with average lower levels of income—for example, Sunderland—would lose out relative to places with higher average incomes, which are disproportionately in London and the south-east. Were such tax changes funded by cutting public services, regions such as the north-east would lose out even more. I hope those matters of context will help inform the debate this afternoon. I will end where I started, with a reflection of public sentiment on living standards. As other Members have mentioned, there is undoubtedly a strength of public feeling on these matters. We have to be frank: it is our job to improve the incomes and lives of the people that we serve. When I am out in Sunderland Central every week, that is the key issue that people raise with me, because for years they have been no better off and, in many cases, they are struggling to make ends meet. I get it. Putting more money in people’s pockets so they can do what they want is the public’s top priority. A key part of that is managing the public finances well. We all saw what the Liz Truss mini-Budget and unfunded half-baked tax plans did to living standards.

• 12 May 2025 · Income Tax: Personal Allowance · Hansard source

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  Of course, I join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to his constituent for securing this debate; 250,000 signatures is an extraordinary level of engagement in the democratic process, and that is to be applauded. I will make some points about the distribution of the benefits of income tax freezes later on in my speech. The cost of the policy requested by the petition depends on the answers to the questions I just posed. Other Members may wish to speak about how they would approach such matters, but, to aid debate, I thought it would be useful to present some indicative costs. At this point, I want to place on record my thanks to the staff of the House, including those from the Petitions Committee and the Library, for their work in helping me to access such information. The House of Commons Library estimates that it would cost more than £60 billion to increase the personal allowance to £20,000, make corresponding increases to the higher rate tax threshold, and raise the national insurance threshold to £20,000 to maintain alignment. That figure is consistent with the range of costs expected by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, which I also met in preparation for this debate. The IFS estimates that increasing the personal allowance to £20,000 would cost somewhere in the range of £40 billion to £90 billion, depending on the choices made on the related tax matters that I have outlined. To put those figures into context, at a minimum cost of £40 billion, the proposal would be at least as large as the tax measures proposed by the September 2022 mini-Budget, which were then quickly reversed after the economy crashed. At the higher end of the estimates—£90 billion—the cost of such a change would be around the same size as the entirety of public revenue spend on education, or two thirds of the total cost of the state pension. It is not for me, in introducing the debate, to advocate one way or another, but I urge Members contributing to speak frankly about the costs and funding of any tax changes they favour. I hope it is also useful briefly to provide some context about how individuals throughout the UK would be impacted by increases in the personal allowance. The IFS notes that the income level of one third of adults is already below the existing personal allowance. That group—those with the lowest incomes in society—would not benefit from the changes sought by the petition, while the greatest benefits would be received by those who are best off. That is to say, in net, such a change would be regressive, increasing inequalities of income.

• 12 May 2025 · Income Tax: Personal Allowance · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered e-petition 702844 relating to the Income Tax Personal Allowance. It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stuart, and it is a privilege to open the debate as a member of the Petitions Committee. All colleagues from all parties will recognise the priority that the public place on improving living standards, as our conversations with constituents, polling and the facts of the matter tell us. The reality is that average disposable incomes after tax fell from 2019-20 to 2023-24 —an unprecedented and shocking situation in which people were left poorer at the end of the last Parliament than they were at the start of it. That is the key context for today’s debate, which has been triggered as a result of more than 250,000 citizens signing the petition on income tax personal allowances. It also speaks to wider and entirely understandable public frustration about living standards. In preparation for the debate, I had the pleasure of talking to Mr Alan Frost, the creator of the petition and a constituent of the hon. Member for Bridgwater (Sir Ashley Fox). Mr Frost, who is in the Gallery, explained that he has recently retired, having worked his whole life. He feels a sense of injustice that his state pension is considered as income for tax purposes, and that the tax thresholds he faces are not increasing. The events that led to that situation are as follows. In the 2021 spring Budget, the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), who was Chancellor at the time, announced that the income tax personal allowance threshold of £12,570 would be frozen until April 2026. In the 2022 autumn statement, the Chancellor at that time, the right hon. Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt), announced that the freeze would be extended for a further two years until April 2028. Following the change of Government, the current Chancellor announced in her autumn 2024 Budget that the freeze would not be extended any further, and therefore income tax personal allowances are expected to next rise in April 2028. Although Mr Frost is a pensioner and his petition reflects a desire to boost pensioner incomes, he also believes that significantly increasing the personal tax allowance would benefit those in work, boosting incomes and reducing the need for benefits. That belief reflects the reality that less than a quarter of the 37 million income tax payers in the UK are over the age of 65. The vast majority of those paying income tax are of working age and are not receiving the state pension. In their written response to the petitioners, the Government highlighted that making the suggested changes to the personal allowance would cost “many billions of pounds”. I am sure that the Minister will say more about that when he responds, but cost is a key element to discuss in our debate. It is Parliament’s responsibility to agree the ways and means of any policy it makes—that is, how to pay for what we decide to do. I gently suggest that the events of the last Parliament remind us how serious that responsibility is. The mini-Budget of September 2022 announced tax cuts costing around £45 billion without explaining how they would be funded, and the market reaction to that announcement left ordinary people paying the price. An emergency reversal of those tax changes followed, but not before high inflation and interest rates hit the standard of living. I therefore urge our debate to be conducted in full consideration of the cost and funding of any tax policy changes. Were income tax personal allowances to rise in the way suggested by the petition, there would be several other linked tax policy choices to be made, and those choices would determine the full cost of the change. For example, would the size of the tax bands above the personal allowance be maintained? Currently, the basic rate of 20% is levied above the personal allowance and up to about £50,000 of income. Would the size of that band be maintained if the personal allowance were increased by £7,500? If so, the point at which the higher rate of tax takes effect would, in turn, increase to almost £58,000, at further cost to the Exchequer. Similarly, the additional rate of tax is currently levied on incomes above £125,000, so if the personal allowance was to rise, would that level rise proportionately too? Finally, the income tax personal allowance is aligned with the level at which people start making national insurance contributions; should that level also rise to £20,000, or would we return to a more complicated tax system in which income tax and national insurance thresholds were no longer harmonised?

• 1 Apr 2025 · NHS Pensions · Hansard source

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  I declare an interest as a member of the NHS pension scheme. Can the Minister confirm that this issue arose only because the previous Government carried out their NHS pension reforms in a way that was found to be age discriminatory? More widely, does she agree that giving NHS staff the terms and conditions and the reward and recognition that they deserve also requires prompt action each year on agreeing the NHS pay award, which the Conservative party routinely failed to do when in Government?

• 25 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-eighth sitting) · Hansard source

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  No, I am going to finish this point. The hon. Member for East Wiltshire did a good job of reading a Bevan quotation before—although I do not advise him to seek Labour party selection with such gravitas in his voice. However, I think he is the heir not to Bevan, but to Bernard Braine, the Member for South East Essex, who said in the 1967 debate on the David Steel abortion Bill: “The idea has been spread around that it will be available on the National Health Service.” In reference to the waiting lists, Braine went on to ask: “Are our consultant gynaecologists going to make that list longer by making beds available to those who want abortions?” —[ Official Report , 13 July 1967; Vol. 750, c. 1382.] That is the tradition of objection that the hon. Member for East Wiltshire is in. Just because he does not wish to have the option for himself, he does not believe that there should be free-at-the-point-of-use provision on the NHS for anyone else. I will take Bevan back to this side of the Committee Room. He said: “The essence of a satisfactory health service is that the rich and the poor are treated alike, that poverty is not a disability and that wealth is not advantaged”. At the moment, at the end of life, wealth clearly is advantaged. Those who are wealthy and are able to go to Switzerland do have choice at the end of life. Dignity and independence and autonomy should not be based on ability to pay. That is why we need to pass this Bill; that is why the powers to commission in new clause 36 are entirely appropriate and necessary; that is why I support it.

• 25 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-ninth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I will be brief. I am in favour of retaining the Bill as it stands. The key thing is the interplay between this clause and clause 42, on commencement. I would have been minded to support changes to the reporting period had the Bill been commencing within two years, as clause 42 as drafted sets out, but my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley has tabled an amendment that will change the backstop of the commencement period to four years. The timescales set out in this clause are from the day on which the Bill is passed. It makes no sense to carry out a formal review of the operation of the legislation before the services have come into being. We will have a four-year timetable, potentially, for the backstop of the commencement. Throughout that time, the annual reporting requirement of the commissioner, who will undoubtedly have been appointed in advance, will kick in. I also draw the Committee’s attention to new clause 35, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge, which speaks to some of the concerns raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford. I strongly support the new clause, and the establishment of a disability advisory board to report annually on the effect on disabled people of not just the Act but the implementation. Picking up any concerns or views about its effect on people with disabilities would happen in a timely manner under new clause 35.

• 25 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-ninth sitting) · Hansard source

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  That is exactly right. For those reasons, I think we need to retain the full five-year review period. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley outlined, the review of the Act by the Secretary of State will be in addition to the annual reporting from the commissioner and, if we accept new clause 35, in addition to annual reports from the disability advisory board. Clearly, over the course of multiple amendments, we will have strengthened the reporting requirements both in advance of and post implementation.

• 19 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I agree that that is what the wording says, but my point is that it is moot. The hon. Lady herself states that the amendment is to prevent an employee from going against the policies of the employer. That power already exists. No healthcare professional says, “Even though I’m employed as a doctor today by such and such a trust, I’m going to do a set of procedures or practices that I want to do.” It is moot. I have no issue with subsection (3)(a) in amendment 481, although I think it is unnecessary. However, I think subsection (3)(b) is deeply problematic. It cuts across employment law protections by referring to selection when hiring employees. There is a reference to the Equality Act, but as others have noted, it is not clear what protected characteristics we are talking about. At a deeper level, if we accept that there is going to be mixed provision, I would argue—and I think this Committee, in a small way, has shown this—that there is some benefit to that. We should not get to a position where every medic of a certain viewpoint on assisted dying works for one organisation and every healthcare professional of a different viewpoint works for another. That is not to say, by any stretch, that organisations would be forced to offer assisted dying. Clearly they would not. If the Bill becomes law, however, I want a society that is relatively at peace with it in healthcare, recognising people’s ability to conscientiously object as individuals. Setting up a dichotomy from the start, in which where a medic decides to work is determined by their views on such and such a procedure, is not a road that we should go down. I also have serious concerns, in terms of employment law, about subsection (3)(b).

• 19 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey, fortified as I am now with a touch of breakfast. I wish to open my comments on this set of amendments by reiterating the importance of respecting people’s beliefs in healthcare and the contribution that people of different faiths, beliefs and positions make, no matter where they come from, in the context of the activities under the Bill. I accept and recognise that amendment 480, in the name of the hon. Member for East Wiltshire, would do an important job in strengthening the Bill’s provisions. I obviously want to hear what the Minister says, and I note the comments from my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley, but I would want to see this sort of expansion in the final Bill when it goes back to the House. If they may not be the exact right words today, I repeat the offer that my hon. Friend has made to work across the divide, as it were, to ensure that such provisions are included in the Bill. With the benefit of an overnight reflection, I feel that last night we got somewhat muddled around some of the objections on conscience, particularly when we go beyond the individual. Amendment 480 and equivalent amendments deal very clearly with individuals not having an obligation to carry out acts that would offend their conscience in the provision of these services. I think we can broadly agree on that. The remainder of the debate got rather muddled between organisations providing assistance under the Bill and the locations at which the final act of an assisted death may take place. I think those are importantly different. On organisations providing assistance, I want to reset things with a common-sense approach to how it will work in practice. The hon. Member for Reigate made the point that hospices should be under no obligation as organisations to provide specific services. I agree. The powers set out under clause 32 for the Secretary of State to make arrangements for the provision of these services, which we will come on to debate at some point, will operate as they do elsewhere across the health service. An NHS organisation or another organisation will say, “This is the set of services that we provide as an organisation.” I see nothing in this Bill that will compel them to do anything other than that. Healthcare organisations up and down the land now make decisions about what is appropriate for them to deliver, based on skills, expertise and demand and whether they think they are well placed to provide care. I agree with the hon. Member for Reigate, but it does not follow that the amendments are required to enforce that principle. As I understand it, because it is permissible, every organisation and every individual practising healthcare professional will be able to say, “On my own bat, I’m not going to participate in this, regardless of what my employer believes,” not least because of clinical governance and regulation. There is already a strong body of healthcare regulation around the acts and services that are provided. It is currently overseen by the Care Quality Commission. We do not need to reinvent that regime. I reassure Members that I think it entirely appropriate for hospices or other providers of palliative care to consider whether they want to participate, should the Bill become law. I imagine we will get to a situation in which some will and some will not, which is absolutely appropriate. Particularly in end-of-life cases, a patient will make a choice on the back of that. I am aware that some end-of-life care providers in my area are actively considering whether this is something that they will do; I am equally aware that there are others that think it is not for them. We heard in evidence that in Australia some providers of palliative care provide integrated, holistic care in which it is one of a number of options, whereas other providers do not. Amendment 481 would insert a new subsection (3)(a) into clause 23, which suggests that an employer has the power to veto an employee doing an act on their time. That is moot: it is not necessary. In the healthcare environments in which I have worked, a doctor may practise elsewhere, doing their own thing, but while they are employed in a certain NHS trust to do an NHS service, they cannot suddenly decide to do something else.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I accept that clause 4(1) rightly sets out that no medical practitioner is under an obligation to raise the subject of assisted dying, but that is not what amendment 50 is about; it is about the information that someone has about the likely effects of taking this course of action, if a patient is to pursue it. In that case, it is entirely right that the GMC guidance would apply, as it would with any other procedure, including very sensitive procedures. Of course, the benefit of having, as set out on a statutory footing, proper medical regulation through the GMC is that it can be updated by the GMC. The question came up previously of why it would be more complicated or burdensome to have some of this set out in primary legislation. When doctors know that they have to refer to the GMC guidance, they are more likely to follow it. If they think, “Oh, hang on. I need to think about what the guidance is in this bit of primary legislation”, where does that stop? Do we start putting in slightly differently worded bits of guidance for information about different areas and procedures? That is a recipe for absolute confusion and less adherence.

• 25 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Thirteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I want to come back to the Bill as drafted. The key factor in clause 2, for me, is the focus on terminality. That is what determines eligibility: that death is reasonably expected within six months. The clauses that we are discussing, subject to amendment, merely clarify—rightly, because this is important, and I too will wait to hear the Government’s guidance—that solely having a disability or a mental disorder does not in itself provoke eligibility. I fear that we are overcomplicating matters; the focus on terminality is in the name of the Bill. It is the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, and that is what we are focusing on today. I urge Members to think about that point when they consider the amendments, including amendment 181 from my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley.

• 30 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Seventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Professor Owen, can I probe a little more something that you raised before—the interaction of potential impairment, potential family dynamics and so on in a way that is not malign, but that you think is a consideration? We have heard some evidence in the course of this week about whether there would be any benefit from a more multidisciplinary approach that could make a more rounded, psychosocial assessment of someone’s situation. That would be less about the clear test of whether there is capacity under the Mental Capacity Act and more about the wider considerations of those interactions. I just wonder whether the inclusion of, say, social workers or mental health professionals as part of a multidisciplinary approach would give you any reassurance on those points that you made. Professor Owen: Good question. On the point about that interaction issue, it is not just me picking it up; it is the courts and the Court of Protection particularly. If you are interested, it is footnote (11) in the written submission from the Complex Life and Death Decisions group. The point that you make is well taken from my point of view. You have two doctors, essentially, doing the assessment. Some doctors can be very good at assessing social circumstances; some are not so good. I think it would be preferable to try to get a law that gets sight of social circumstances; one way of doing that may be to insert a requirement that a suitably experienced social worker is involved, so that there is some sensitivity to those contextual, relational, interpersonal effects, which, as I know you are aware, can be very subtle. A lot of these things are extremely difficult to pick up. They are easy to miss and, even when you are aware of them, there can be dilemmas about what to do with them. Professor Hoyano: Might I add a postscript to that? A model that we could consider in this context is CAFCASS—the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service—in the family courts. It is a body of experts—civil servants, in effect—but they are independent and they are accustomed to dealing with specific context with social workers, for example. They investigate what should happen to a child in public law or private law proceedings. It occurs to me that something like that—a report from an equivalent body to the solicitor’s office, which I mentioned before—could be a very good way of building that in, because I completely agree that social workers are likely to be more professionally attuned, by virtue of their training and experience, to looking at the wider context.

• 30 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Mr Greenwich, we are minded that as well as passing really good legislation we want to get public confidence behind this. We have heard a level of concern from disabled people’s representative bodies about the inadvertent implications of this law for disabled people. Were those concerns shared when you took your legislation through, and how it has gone since the implementation of the legislation? Alex Greenwich: In New South Wales, and across Australia, having a disability or complex mental health issue like anorexia does not make you eligible at all for voluntary assisted dying. The legislation we are dealing with and you are dealing with is not for people with a disability or anorexia nervosa, and not for people who feel they are a burden. It is for people with a terminal illness who may want the choice of a death that is better than what the illness would otherwise provide. We worked closely with disability groups in New South Wales. Their main concern was that they would be treated equally in terms of access to the law if a person with a disability had a terminal illness. The key point is that this legislation is a safeguard to those concerns. To the point about people who are starving themselves, that is happening today in the UK because people do not have access to voluntary assisted dying. They are starving themselves to death rather than accessing a regulated scheme where they can discuss all their options and choices.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Second sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q I have one follow-up on that. At the moment, we are aware that there are instances across the NHS every day where people make decisions around refusing the treatment that would be required to prolong their life. Doctors, nurses and the healthcare team would be involved in assessing capacity and coercion around those cases. Can you tell me a bit about any learnings from that, about the levels of skill required in the current practice around refusing lifesaving treatment, and about how that might be taken into account in the Bill? Professor Whitty: You are absolutely right: it is a completely normal part of medical and wider nursing, and other practice, but particularly medical practice, to consider issues of consent and capacity. It can be that someone says they do not want treatment that is clearly going to be lifesaving. A very well-known example is that of Jehovah’s Witnesses, who choose not to have blood products. If they are bleeding heavily, that is an issue that could lead to the end of their life. Provided they understand that and they have capacity, that has to be respected. The alternative way—the other thing that doctors have to do—is to give people advice before they have major operations, chemotherapy or other drugs that may in themselves lead to the end of their life, but which also may lead to a benefit. Explaining to people the risks and benefits, including the fact that they may lose their life as a result of the next stage—if someone is at high anaesthetic risk, that is not a trivial risk sometimes with operations—is a very standard part of medical practice that you do from the point that you qualify. Obviously, as people get more senior, they tend to be more experienced in it—and, as with most things, if you get more experience, you generally get better at it.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Third sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q We have heard from two witnesses—you, Sir Nicholas, and Dr Ahmedzai from the earlier panel—on the question of judicial oversight. While we have you here, Sir Max and Mr Ruck Keene, what are your observations on the proposals from those two witnesses that an alternative to a High Court judge overseeing the process would be some form of panel or tribunal, potentially multidisciplinary? What is your view on that and the legal implications for that? Sir Max Hill: I would say two things. First, it bears weight that, looking at all the provisions in the Bill, the additional level of scrutiny currently being called judicial scrutiny or approval is absent in all the comparative examples around the world. That already makes this a tighter pre-legislative model than we see in other countries that have gone down this route. That is worth remembering. Secondly, while I am not a family lawyer—I was, but a very long time ago—I think that the family division of the High Court would be very well-placed to perform the sort of exercise enshrined in current drafting, which is not a rubber-stamping exercise, but a substantive consideration of heavily objective medical opinion arrived at by not one, but two doctors, one of whom is not the treating doctor. I listen to and accept the question of pressure on the justice system generally. That is something the Committee will be concerned about because, if the Bill passes, we want something workable. I heed what Sir James Munby said. The sitting judiciary, for good constitutional reasons, is highly unlikely to say anything. But there is therefore merit in looking at clause 12, under the heading, “Court approval”, and performing quite a simple exercise, which for me would be going through subsections (1) to (6) inclusive and, where it says “High Court”, replace that with something else. Personally, I have an aversion to the word “tribunal”, which indicates a right and wrong or some kind of fault-based system—that is not what we are talking about here. But a panel, as Nick said, is the way to go— Sir Nicholas Mostyn : A panel appointed by the Official Solicitor. Sir Max Hill: Whether appointed by the Official Solicitor or not. Dare I say it—because I am sitting next to a very distinguished one—I do wonder about the recently retired members of the judiciary and the role that they could play under a replacement panel system. Sir Nicholas Mostyn: That is what I had in mind—the Official Solicitor looking at the retired judges. Sir Max Hill: Yes, so there is legal professional capacity among the retired judges—not that they would sit alone on a panel. It would bring with it the extra benefit of having suitably qualified medical professionals, like the Spanish model. So yes, I think that could be done. That is not the same thing as saying that the High Court approval model is fatally flawed and could not be introduced, but I do think there is a viable alternative, which is worth looking at. Alex Ruck Keene: I have only one observation, and I said this in my written evidence but I also want to say it out loud. You have to think very carefully about what purpose any form of this oversight is actually serving societally, if the oversight panel, whether that be a judge or a panel, cannot decline to approve an application if it considers that the reason the individual is seeking assistance in dying is because of service provision failures by the statutory bodies responsible for meeting their health and social care needs. That is a question of principle, and I want to make sure that that is squarely before you.

• 21 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  I agree with the comments of the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough. The hon. Member for East Wiltshire said at the start that the purpose of this Committee was not to relitigate the principle of the vote that we had on Second Reading. Yet in his comment just now, he talked about weighing up the numbers in favour or against, which entirely suggests that the issue of witness evidence selection exists in his head and that he is relitigating matters. I come to the issues around the Australian amendment—amendment (f). Of course the expertise will come from people who are participating in the system. By definition, they are not ethically opposed to it, because if they were opposed to it on the basis of conscience, they would not be participating in the system in Australia. As the Bill makes amply clear, no medical professional or health professional here will be under any obligation to participate in the system here. Therefore, in order for this Committee to do the serious work of making sure that the Bill is as robust and workable as possible, we need to hear overwhelmingly from people involved in this practice in other jurisdictions, to benefit from their expertise. We do not need to hear from people from other jurisdictions who are, in principle, opposed to this practice. Why would it be appropriate to remove the evidence of a palliative care physician involved in this practice in favour of a head of infectious diseases, whose relevance I do not see because they are not engaged in this practice? That just highlights my point. I commend my hon. Friend, Kim Leadbeater, for the flexibility she has already shown today in adding names, and for the spirit that she has shown so far. The fact is that all these individuals may give written evidence that we will all consider. I am in favour of us moving on, getting our evidence sessions done and making progress, and dealing with the detail of the Bill, rather than using the selection of witnesses to try to relitigate the Second Reading debate.

• 17 Dec 2024 · Women’s State Pension Age Communication: PHSO Report · Hansard source

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  It is no small thing for a Secretary of State to stand up with the sincerity that my right hon. Friend has and to offer an apology on behalf of the Government and accept maladministration, and I know she takes that responsibility seriously. I understand her position regarding the 90% of women who knew the pension age was going to change, but among the 10% who did not realise, people made individual decisions about their financial circumstances. Will she say more about why she did not feel that it was possible to put an individualised compensation scheme in place for that 10%?

• 11 Nov 2024 · Pension Credit: Uptake · Hansard source

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  4. What steps she is taking to increase uptake of pension credit in winter 2024-25.

• 11 Nov 2024 · Pension Credit: Uptake · Hansard source

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  Under the previous Conservative Government, many eligible pensioners in Sunderland Central did not receive the pension credit that they were due. When I speak to organisations such as Age UK Sunderland, they tell me that that was often because people did not know how and whether to claim. How many pensioners are now taking up pension credit thanks to the actions taken by this Government?