Pensions Bill [Ways and Means]

House of Commons, 15 November 2004.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

I beg to move,

That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Pensions Bill, it is expedient to authorise the levying of charges by virtue of the Act for the purpose of meeting expenditure of the Secretary of State to or in respect of the Ombudsman for the Board of the Pension Protection Fund.

The Bill provides for the Secretary of State to appoint an ombudsman for the pension protection fund. This is a new office which is being set up to provide an independent forum for dealing with PPF disputes.

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

rose—

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

I have not got to the very exciting bit yet, but will happily give way if the hon. Gentleman cannot contain himself.

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

I am grateful to the Minister, and I do not want him to get too excited too early in his speech. Will he confirm that it is still the Government's thinking, as emerged in Committee, that at least to begin with the self-same person will be both the pensions ombudsman and the PPF ombudsman?

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

Yes, I am happy to confirm that. Clearly, in the early months of the pension protection fund—perhaps the first year or so—there should be little demand on the ombudsman. We therefore think it important that the same individual—the same man in this case—should undertake both roles. [Interruption.] I can deal with this matter relatively briefly, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Whether the House can is out of my hands.

When we debated the clauses on the pension protection fund ombudsman in this House on 20 April, the Bill made provision for the costs of the ombudsman and his office and staff to be provided by grant-in-aid by the Secretary of State. That would require the general taxpayer to foot the bill.

On reflection, we introduced an amendment in the other place allowing regulations to be made to allow the grant-in-aid to be recouped by a levy on pension schemes. That brings the funding of the PPF ombudsman into line with the approach already in place for organisations such as the pensions ombudsman, the PPF board and the pensions regulator. [Interruption.] I know that the hon. Member for West Derbyshire (Mr. McLoughlin) follows such things with great interest.

Michael Fallon (Conservative, Sevenoaks)

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way so early. Can we just be clear about what he is saying? When he refers to the levying of a charge, what he actually means is a stealth tax on business.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

We think that as this measure is of benefit to people in, to use the jargon, final salary schemes or defined benefit schemes, and not to the general public or even to the general body of all people in personal pensions, it is not unreasonable that that group rather than the general body of taxpayers should pay the cost.

John Bercow (Conservative, Buckingham)

Will the Minister give way?

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

Let me make a little more progress; the hon. Gentleman can polish his question even further if I give him a few more seconds. [Laughter.] Well, I have heard him before, and a little more polish always helps.

This measure brings the funding of the PPF ombudsman into line with the approach already in place for similar organisations. We do not envisage that the costs involved will be major. For example, the total costs of the existing pensions ombudsman in 2002–03 were under £1.5 million, which covered all the disputes and complaints referred to him. By contrast, the PPF ombudsman's remit covers just the pension protection fund, so we do not expect substantial costs.

John Bercow (Conservative, Buckingham)

It is always a pleasure to listen to the Minister's mellifluous tones, but none of us would want him to proceed at an excessive pace. He referred a moment ago to regulations. Will those regulations be subject to the negative procedure or to its affirmative counterpart?

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

That is an extremely good question, and I thought that I might deal with that point very shortly. I am bound to say that it is always useful to give the one-nation tendency in the Conservative party— I think that the hon. Gentleman is still a member of that group—an opportunity. [Interruption.] I can now reply in the affirmative: the regulations will be subject to the affirmative procedure.

While the costs will be payable by all eligible—[Interruption.] There is a certain degree of end-of-term amusement on the Opposition Benches, which is slightly premature at this point. Opposition Members have obviously read the jokes that I took out of my speech. While the costs will be payable by all eligible pension schemes, the PPF ombudsman will be independent, because he will be appointed by the Secretary of State and not the PPF board. Although I have been urged by the left wing of the Tory party not to rush my remarks on this important matter, I shall do so on this occasion, and I therefore commend the motion to the House.

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

The key words in this apparently harmless piece of verbiage are "the levying of charges". Of course, the Minister, in his habitual fashion, has tried, with honeyed words, to suggest that that is the right and sensible thing to be doing. However, it is nothing of the sort. As my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) pointed out, this is yet another stealth tax on business.

The Minister was good enough to establish one point, which arose out of a proposal made by our side in Committee, which is that we should draw on the experience and wisdom of the existing ombudsman, so that—at least to begin with—Mr. Laverick will be both the pensions ombudsman and the PPF ombudsman. Sadly for Mr. Laverick, I do not think that that dual role will require two salaries, but I suspect that it will mean extra staff, so we should not allow the Minister to persuade the House that no extra cost is built into this part of the elaborate bureaucracy that the Bill has set up.

The real issue is the switching of the burden of this new office, and its back-up staff, to business and industry. Only a few days ago, the Department sneaked out a written statement, very quietly and without fanfare, that made it clear that the pension protection fund would, in some respects, be retrospective and might take into account companies such as Turner and Newell, if their pension schemes got into difficulties between now and when the Pensions Bill comes into effect. Of course, one can see the motivation for that. It is becoming apparent, almost day by day, that the Government's financial assistance scheme is woefully inadequate for its purpose of compensating people— I should say, of assisting people. The Secretary of State has made a distinction between compensation and assistance. The latter is a handout of only a tiny fraction of the benefits that would have been available to the people involved if they had been lucky enough to qualify under the PPF after April next year.

The boundaries have been blurred—we will no doubt debate the point at greater length tomorrow—between the pension protection fund and the financial assistance scheme. However, the point is that the PPF will be financed by a levy on business. Because of the slowness in introducing a risk-based levy, that levy will be a flat rate for a significant period, reflecting no risk and not distinguishing between good schemes and bad schemes, well run schemes and badly run schemes, or schemes with poor investments and schemes with better investments. The result, of course, will be that the good will subsidise the bad, and the measure that we are asked to approve today is an example of that. The Government's default position throughout the Bill has been, wherever possible, to heap more burdens on business, and the motion is another clear example of that.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

Is the hon. Gentleman's position on behalf of the Conservative party that the taxpayer should pay? As I recall, in Committee the Conservative Opposition supported the idea of an ombudsman, for perfectly sensible reasons. That position has to be paid for. How does the hon. Gentleman think it should be paid for?

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

The Conservatives resist attempts to heap more taxation on people. The reality is that we suggested—in fairness, I must add that the Minister took up the suggestion—that a new person was not needed to carry out the job of the new ombudsman. We hoped that there would be some saving, because the same person would be involved. We are trying to make the point that—[Interruption.] If the Minister stops chuntering, he may learn something. Well run companies with decently run pension schemes will already face a flat-rate levy from the start of the pension protection fund. That will be a significant burden on them, and yet another reason for the decline of defined benefit schemes.

Following the Minister's announcement the other day, we now know that, on top of that, the PPF may well open its doors with a substantial deficit caused by schemes swept up prior to April next year. Incidentally, that announcement was not adverted to at all either in the debate in the House of Lords, or during departmental questions on the same day.

Leaving that aside, there is already a significant burden on business. That may explain, in part, why the Minister's rather naive hopes that industry would come forward voluntarily with money to boost the financial assistance scheme seems not to have borne any fruit. As I said, the motion will mean yet another burden on companies that support the PPF from April next year, because of the flat-rate levy that they will be paying. There will be no option for the better companies to pay less because they are better organised and run better pension schemes; the motion will simply add to the levy that they will already be paying.

As I have made clear, the Conservatives regret the fact that the Government continue to regard British business as merely a milch cow from which they can draw ever greater contributions to help pay for this flawed layer of bureaucracy that they are setting up, to try to deal with a pensions crisis that they have done so much to create.

Steve Webb (Liberal Democrat, Northavon)

I am not sure whether that was a yes or a no. It is unclear to me whether Her Majesty's official Opposition are going to vote against the motion—[Interruption.] The tension is almost palpable.

The Ways and Means motion proposes that we work on the assumption that there will be an ombudsman for the pension protection fund. As a constituency Member who regularly finds that going to an ombudsman is the only way to resolve complex and difficult disputes independently, I think it entirely appropriate that there should be such an ombudsman.

I was rather surprised that the Minister did not tell us how much might be raised by the levy, and that was a rather regrettable omission. He said that the sum would be less than £1.5 million, but there is a big gap between £1.5 million and zero. I hope that, in responding to the debate, the Minister will at least give us some flavour of the amount of money that the House is giving the Secretary of State permission to levy. To ask how much might be raised seems a basic question to make of a Ways and Means resolution. The Minister did not tell us; he said, or implied, that it would not be more than £1.5 million, but will he give an idea of the order of magnitude that he is talking about?

The Liberal Democrats are of the view that there should be such an ombudsman, that that ombudsman has to be paid for, and that those who will benefit from the existence of the ombudsman are those with final salary or other defined benefit occupational schemes that are covered by the PPF. It is rather difficult to see why, if this body has to be paid for, it should be paid for by those who do not even have final salary or defined benefit pensions. In other words, in pensions, increasingly there are—to use an old phrase—two nations: those who have final salary, high-quality pensions and those at the mercy of the stock market. It seems odd to suggest that people whose pensions have no promise attached be asked to pay for a dispute resolution procedure for those who have better pensions, or indeed that the general taxpayer, who may have no pension at all beyond that provided by the state, be asked to pay for such a procedure.

It is hard to understand what the Conservative response actually meant. I think it was against a levy on PPF scheme members, so I take it that it supported a levy on the general taxpayer. That point will have been noted far and wide, as our debates are followed closely.

Michael Fallon (Conservative, Sevenoaks)

Presumably, the hon. Gentleman has noticed that if the levy is to be charged on other final salary schemes, it will fall on us—on the parliamentary pension fund, as a successful final salary scheme. Has he consulted his colleagues about voting in favour of the motion?

Steve Webb (Liberal Democrat, Northavon)

On the assumption that our scheme is not covered by the pension protection fund, the levy would not fall on us, but I am open to amendment or correction on that point.

I have a question for the Minister. In his remarks, he referred to the fact that when we first discussed the issue in April—was it really all that time ago?—the original assumption was that the cost would be funded by the general taxpayer. Nothing changed, as far as I can see, between April and September, when his noble Friend Baroness Hollis said, on reflection, that it would be funded by a levy, so can the Minister explain why the Government changed their mind on that point? What changed? Or was it yet another of those last-minute changes to the Pensions Bill that we have grown all too fond of seeing?

The Bill will come back to us tomorrow and we shall debate the substantive issues then, but even on the eve of those final discussions, things are still changing. It is another hallmark of a Bill that has not been properly thought through or prepared that on the eve of its final return—perhaps not even its final return—to the House we are still debating last-minute changes of mind and Government second thoughts. It is worrying that a framework that affects the whole pensions system and which should be in place for a generation is being written on the back of an envelope and cobbled together by the Government as they go along.

On this specific last-minute change, however, the Government have got things right. If the ombudsman service has to be paid for, as clearly it does, it is appropriate that it be paid for by people who will benefit from its existence and not by those who may have no pension at all. I am not sure whether the Conservatives disagree with me, as it is a complete mystery to me what points—if any—the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) was trying to make. I assume that his colleagues will try to extend the debate to its full 45 minutes, so I shall stand in their way no longer.

Michael Fallon (Conservative, Sevenoaks)

I shall try to answer the point made by the hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) when I conclude my remarks and offer my advice on which way we should vote.

The decision on how the ombudsman scheme should be funded is a harbinger of what is in store for us. We debated the whole matter about six months ago and it is already becoming clear that under the legislation there will be more and more disputes to be sorted out—whether they involve the financial assistance scheme on the one hand, or the PPF on the other. As I shall point out in our debate tomorrow—if I am fortunate enough to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker—we are, in essence, setting up a new form of business regulator and, as the Minister has finally realised, that regulator has to be paid for.

The Minister's real fear is, of course, that the costs of the new regulation will be large and much more substantial than originally envisaged, because there will be disputes all over the place. There are already disputes about the scope of the financial assistance scheme—when it should apply and to whom, which schemes will be covered and so on—but they are as nothing to the disputes that will occur under the PPF once it is established. All that new regulation must be paid for.

Ombudsmen are almost becoming a new form of regulator. When they were first set up, they were to deal with individual cases of injustice—to rule on those cases and advise the House on them—but they have now become part of the regulatory system itself. The Minister clearly expects many cases to go to them.

Who should pay? What is clear from the motion is that the levy will fall on successful schemes. I hope the Minister has considered the fairness of that. If the levy is to be straightforward, and with no variation according to risk, as my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) pointed out, it will be even more unfair, as it will bear more heavily on schemes that happen to be well funded and well managed than on those that are not. That is not particularly fair.

Will the levy also bear on the smallest schemes? We read that those companies that have set up small-scale schemes to benefit small work forces are already fearful of the additional costs involved under the Bill in having to bail out those schemes that are on less secure ground. Of course, the House has a parallel: we were asked, under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, to set up the new, all-powerful Financial Services Authority. That, too, is an example of a regulator with its own power to tax; it can set its own scale of charges, thus imposing on the good the cost of policing the bad. We should not authorise this new stealth tax on business without being sure that the Minister is doing everything possible to reduce the scope of disputes that are likely to be referred to the ombudsman.

As we shall see tomorrow, we will end up at the end of the Pensions Bill with the worst of all worlds: fewer final salary schemes, but more and more disputes about them. That brings me, finally, to the way in which we on the Opposition Benches should decide to vote. In my view, as we can see with the last-minute haste with which the Ways and Means resolution has been introduced this evening, the Pensions Bill has been a mess. This has been a very sad story from beginning to end. A raft of clauses was added to the Bill in Committee. All those clauses have been revised in the other place, as we shall see tomorrow. Even last Friday, the Government were still making announcements about how the burden of the new legislation would be financed. The Pensions Bill is a mess created by the Government, and it will make the provision and safeguarding of pensions worse. For those reasons, we should oppose the motion.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

It is always a great pity that these apparently innocuous Ways and Means resolutions attract such relatively little attention from colleagues in the House, because they are, of course, a very important part of what remains of the House's influence on the sort of measures that flow from legislation. I should like to think that in some ways Members would be more interested in Ways and Means resolutions than in many other aspects of the Bills themselves.

Some of the Minister's phrases—innocuous and soothing though they were intended to sound—rang a number of alarm bells, certainly in my mind. I made a note of the one that sticks out. He actually had to the gall to say, almost with a straight face, that all was okay, as the ombudsman would be independent because he will be appointed by the Secretary of State. That is a new doctrine altogether. We are now expected to believe that someone will be independent because he or she is appointed by the Secretary of State. I should have thought that that was a complete contradiction in terms, and it immediately set me worrying about what we are being asked to do.

I must confess that I am not the biggest fan of the institution of ombudsmen.

John Bercow (Conservative, Buckingham)

Or of the Secretary of State.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

Indeed, as my hon. Friend says, or of the Secretary of State, but let us leave the Secretary of State out of this for the moment; we might bring him back a bit later because he is mentioned in the motion, thus giving us ample scope.

What worries me about the institution of ombudsmen—taken some years ago from Scandinavia, as I recall—is that, generally speaking, they have few, if any, powers.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

Europe.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

The Minister says, "Europe". I shall get him into Hansard; I am generous in that way. Of course, some parts of Europe have been extraordinarily sensible: the Norwegians, who are a favourite of these occasions, are a shining example to us all in matters European. I often wish that we could emulate them.

Michael Lord (Deputy Speaker, Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)

Order. The right hon. Gentleman is an experienced Member of the House and he knows that this is not the occasion for a general dissertation on the origins of ombudsmen.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

Nor, indeed, Norway, when it comes to that. The Minister did provoke me, but I will try to resist his blandishments.

Leaving aside the origins of the institution of ombudsman for a moment, I was going to say that I am unhappy about the appearance of the ombudsman in this Ways and Means resolution because I am not convinced that ombudsmen are the great power for good that everybody seems to have come to accept that they are. I say that not only because they may have been appointed by the Secretary of State, which immediately puts a question mark over their usefulness, but because, generally speaking, they have no powers. We therefore get frustrated citizens coming to us time and time again because they expected miracles of this or that ombudsman, only to find subsequently that very little happened as a result of the ombudsman's ruling.

Steve Webb (Liberal Democrat, Northavon)

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way, and it is always a joy to watch a master at work. Which aspect of the powers that the Bill gives the PPF ombudsman does the right hon. Gentleman think are inadequate?

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

I would say—

Michael Lord (Deputy Speaker, Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)

Order. The right hon. Gentleman is being tempted way beyond the scope of the motion. We are not discussing whether there should be an ombudsman; we are simply discussing how he should be funded.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

Yes, indeed, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am devastated that I am unable to give the hon. Gentleman a comprehensive reply. Perhaps we will leave that for another day; indeed, it might even be tomorrow if we follow the example of my neighbour and hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon).

The proposition that the Minister has brought before us is that the operation of the ombudsman will be paid for by the levy, which has quite rightly become the main object of our attention in the debate because it is the reason why the Ways and Means resolution has had to be brought to the House. Quite rightly, therefore, we are involved in a proper debate about the nature of the levy. This debate takes place against the background of the fact that, as we all know, the whole pensions industry—the whole institution of pensions in this country—is under severe strain and likely, sadly, to continue to be so. As if to add insult to injury, the Government have come forward with additional bureaucracy, whose virtues I am unable to extol because of your ruling, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I have no problem with that at all. However, this additional bureaucracy will involve additional cost and will therefore give rise to a levy on the very pension funds that are already under strain. That simply adds to the general accusation that we can make against the Government that the pensions industry is in dire straits largely because of actions taken by the Government over a period of time. Sadly, the resolution, which we are being asked to approve, will add to that phenomenon; it does not help the industry in any way. Personally, I would question whether it helps pension holders or beneficiaries, but we are not here to explore that on this occasion, are we Mr. Deputy Speaker?

So, we have the levy. The Minister tried to reassure us by saying that we were not to be too worried about it, because it would cost a mere £1.5 million—he threw that figure in as if it were a bagatelle. We are all too used now to Ministers coming to the House and bandying such figures around as if they were of no consequence whatever. Of course, to Ministers in this Government, a million here, a million there and a billion somewhere else are of little consequence. However, if they spend a billion here and a billion there, it adds up to real money in the end. Therefore, it is our duty as representatives of taxpayers or indeed, as on this occasion, of pension holders to worry about such things and to wonder whether this £1.5 million will be well spent and whether there will truly be beneficiaries. Lurking at the back of my mind is the suspicion that this may be yet another bureaucracy or yet another enhancement to an existing bureaucracy—it really makes very little difference—that has little or no benefit in the end.

Under the guise of this apparently innocuous Ways and Means resolution, there lurk all sorts of very worrying issues—the levy, the amount of the levy, the bureaucracy that will be created and, worst of all perhaps, the Minister's assertion that we need not worry, because the Secretary of State will see it all right in the end. I am sure that the Minister has the greatest respect for the Secretary of State, and would that he were with us today to give us some reassurance as to how the independence of this person whom he will appoint will be maintained. Again, however, that is not something that we should be pursuing on this occasion. However, the thought must linger.

So, all in all, this apparently innocuous little measure has a number of very unsatisfactory aspects.

John Bercow (Conservative, Buckingham)

I am reluctant to have to chide publicly my right hon. Friend, but it really is about time, after his 21 years in the House, that he told us what he really thinks. His tendency to self-effacement is pretty unsatisfactory. I want the gravamen behind his argument to be clear in my mind. Is he saying to the House that the problem with the ombudsman will be that he or she will tend to be the craven lickspittle of the Government, that he or she will make no decisions, or that he or she will, in the end, be inclined simply to prevaricate?

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

rose—

Michael Lord (Deputy Speaker, Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)

Order. I can save the right hon. Gentleman the embarrassment of having to respond to that dangerous intervention. We are not discussing that matter today, but simply the cost of the ombudsman.

Eric Forth (Conservative, Bromley and Chislehurst)

Yes, indeed, which prevents me from saying that I could not agree more with my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow)—you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, would not want to say that in these circumstances. I am grateful to my hon. Friend because given that the resolution refers explicitly to the ombudsman, we must give a passing thought to whether we will get value for money from the levy that is linked to the ombudsman. That gives rise to speculation about how effective the ombudsman might be, which was, I think, the point that my hon. Friend was trying to get at, although I would of course not dream of pursuing it because it is not for me to dwell on lickspittles, prevarication, or any other aspect of what the ombudsman might be able to do on behalf of pension holders.

The Minister will have to do much better than he did in his opening remarks to persuade me and, I suspect, one or two of my hon. Friends, that we should approve the Ways and Means resolution. Perhaps it should be taken away and thought about for a longer time so that we can spare such a burden from the already over-burdened holders of pensions.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

With the leave of the House, I shall respond to the debate.

I understand that the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) regularly entertains the House on Fridays with such fearless scrutiny. It makes me sad that I cannot be here to see it more often, but my constituency engagements often make me busy on Fridays and I fully intend that to remain the case.

I shall not say that this debate is much ado about nothing, because it has something to do with public spending—I certainly do not wish to provoke the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst into another speech. However, we are talking about a relatively small amount of public money.

I was not quite sure what the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) was saying, which was a difficulty that I had with him in recent months in Committee. I think the Tories' position, despite the variety of views expressed by their renegade Back Benchers, is that they support the ombudsman, but I am unclear about how they would pay for it. The hon. Gentleman talks about stealth taxes on business, but if he is against funding the ombudsman through schemes, he is saying, by implication, that the taxpayer should fund it. Why? I can tell the hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) that having reflected on the matter, we thought that it would be fairer for schemes to pay for the ombudsman. The Tory position is, as usual, absolutely unclear. I shall not be tempted into talking about risk-based or flat-rate levies because they are not relevant to the modest, yet important, motion.

The levy will be relatively small. The £1.5 million figure that I cited is the current cost incurred through the pensions ombudsman. If that were replicated for the pension protection fund ombudsman, the cost would be 10p per member per year. However, we expect the cost to be much less—no more than perhaps 6p per member per year. Although I appreciate what the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, we are talking about only a few pence per year, which must be far less than the cost of several hon. Members' fearless scrutiny of legislation in the House of Commons—important and vital though some would no doubt say that that is.

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

Will the Minister give way?

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

I am happy to give way because I am anxious for clarification of the Tories' position.

Nigel Waterson (Conservative, Eastbourne)

I am anxious for clarification of the Government's position. As the hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) shows no sign of stirring, I thought that I would ask the Minister a question on his behalf. If we are talking about such a small amount—we have heard that one before in Committee—why did the Government change their mind about the funding of the personage?

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

Well, £1 million is £1 million, and we thought, on balance, that that should be paid by schemes whose members could in extremis—we hope that they will not have to call on the PPF—benefit from the fund. We do not think that it would be right for the general taxpayer to pay for the ombudsman. I remain uncertain about how the Tories would pay for a measure that I think they support. I shall give way if the hon. Member for Eastbourne wishes to clarify their position. Obviously he does not wish to do so.

I was not sure whether the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) was opposing the pension protection fund and thus the ombudsman. Is he at odds with his Front Bench? I repeat that we are discussing an important safeguard and that the ombudsman will cost only a few pence per member per year.

We heard a lot from the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst—

John Bercow (Conservative, Buckingham)

Right hon. Member.

Malcolm Wicks (Labour, Croydon North)

We heard a lot from the very right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst, but I was not sure what he was saying. Does he support the pension protection fund? If he does support it, does he support the idea of an ombudsman? [Interruption.] I am trying to bring a little gravitas to what has been a fairly light-hearted debate. If the right hon. Gentleman is in favour of the ombudsman, how will he pay for it? That is not clear, but what is clear is that the Government support the PPF. We think that there should be a PPF ombudsman and we have clear views about how the modest cost should be paid.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,