CLAWBACK OF OCCUPATIONAL PENSIONS

Early day motion 311, tabled 8 February 2001 by Linda Perham (Labour). Signed by 138 members.

That this House believes that the practice of integrating occupational pensions with the state pension, commonly known as clawback, which allows employers to deduct a significant proportion of their employees' pension, affecting up to 2.5 million pensioners across the United Kingdom and hitting the lowest paid and part-time workers hardest, is unfair, as pensioners who have paid national insurance contributions all their working lives are entitled to benefit from the provisions intended by Government to be available to all; and believes that the Government should legislate to phase out this practice, following the example set by the Republic of Ireland where a recently introduced Bill, which had the full support of the Irish Government, states that the amount deducted from occupational pension payments by trustees of pension schemes cannot increase when the amount of the state pension is increased, effectively freezing the amount which can be deducted.

Signatures by party: Labour 97, Liberal Democrat 20, Labour/Co-operative 6, Conservative 4, Plaid Cymru 3, Independent 2, Scottish National Party 2, UUP 2, Social Democratic and Labour Party 1, UKUP 1.