Labour backbencher tables motion opposing Andy Burnham’s plan to cut pensions triple lock
The Labour MP has warned Burnham’s plan to cut the triple lock to fund social care ‘could be as politically unpopular as Starmer’s winter fuel debacle’
Neil Duncan-Jordan MP has tabled a motion opposing the Government’s plan to fund social care by removing the triple lock on pensions.
Duncan-Jordan is calling on Andy Burnham’s government to fund social care through progressive taxation rather than by removing the triple lock on pensions.
The Poole MP was one of four Labour MPs who had the whip removed for being a “persistent rebel” and opposing Keir Starmer’s proposed welfare benefit cuts.
Yesterday, he tabled an Early Day Motion (EDM) calling on the government to keep the triple lock on pensions.
EDMs are almost never debated in the Commons, but can be signed by other MPs and serve to draw attention to a particular issue.
So far, Labour MPs Kim Johnson, Jon Trickett, John McDonnell and Brian Leishman have signed the motion, as has Democratic Unionist MP Jim Shannon.
The triple lock means the state pension will rise either by the rate of inflation, average earnings or 2.5% – whichever is highest.
Burnham has committed to keeping the triple lock in place until 2030, but has said he will reform it after that to help fund a new national care service.
The motion reads: “That this House urges the Government to retain the triple lock on pensions in its current form.”
It also states that the EDM “rejects claims that pensioners have it too good, noting the UK provides a less generous State Pension than comparable countries despite having an older retirement age than the OECD average”.
It adds that “protecting the State Pension against rising living costs is essential to ensuring future generations can retire securely, and that an expansive social care system free at the point of use is essential to older people’s welfare”.
Duncan-Jordan’s motion also “rejects funding decent social care by cutting other parts of the social safety net; and calls on the Government to fund both strong pensions and a National Care Service through progressive taxation, ensuring that after a lifetime of work people can enjoy dignity”.
Commenting on the motion, Duncan-Jordan said: “Andy Burnham was absolutely right to say he would fix our broken social care system, but he was wrong to argue that this should be funded by scrapping the state pension triple lock.
“Commentators across the political class often reach for what they think is such low-hanging fruit and decry the triple lock as some unnecessary, extravagant expenditure that simply props up wealthy pensioners who spend all their time on lavish cruises.
“The UK still has 1.9m older people living in poverty. Means-testing doesn’t work because for decades hundreds of thousands of pensioners eligible for pension credit have never received it and millions more have incomes just above the poverty level.”
He added: “What’s more is that future generations are going to rely on the state pension even more than their parents and grandparents do.
“But most of all – I want the Burnham government to succeed, and the triple lock proposal could be as politically unpopular as Starmer’s winter fuel debacle.
“That’s why I’m urging the PM to think again. Let’s fund a better care system by asking all of us to pay for it – not just pensioners.”
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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