Press briefing from the Prime Ministers Official Spokesman on: Pensions and Education
Pensions
Asked if the Prime Minister had chosen whether there was going to be an increase in taxes, or if people would have to work longer, or if people would have to save more as the answer to the pensions crisis, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) told the journalist that it was better to wait until the 30th November when the Turner Report was published, and then we would give our response. As the PMOS had said this morning, the important thing was that no-one should rule anything in or anything out at this stage.
Asked if the Government was committed to doing something before the next election, the PMOS said that the position remained the same as was stated during the election, but people should wait until the 30th November.
Put to the PMOS that during the election, it was stated that pensions should be a matter for public discussion, and was it not in the manifesto, the PMOS said again it was better to wait until the 30th November, and then the Government would respond in the way that it was going to respond.
Asked if the position had therefore not changed, the PMOS said that Ministers had stated the position during the election campaign, so we should wait until the 30th November, see the report, and then we would respond.
Put that as the PMOS had said that nothing could be ruled out of the Turner report, and that it might include people working until they were 67, how did the Prime Minister therefore justify the deal done with the trade unions that public sector workers should continue to retire at 60, or did the Prime Minister regret it, the PMOS said that it was purely coincidental that the journalist missed out the PMOS’s words when he had also said that nothing should be ruled in! In terms of the public sector pension deal, as the PMOS had said over the past two days, that £13 billion would be saved between now and 2050. When the new pension arrangements come into place next year, and there was a ten per cent turnover of civil servants per year, that meant in seven years time, fifty per cent of the staff would be working under the new pensions arrangements. Within a decade, because of the turnover, the vast majority of civil servants would be working under the new scheme. As people could see, in terms of the turnover of staff, the proportion of staff who would not be affected by the new arrangements would fall substantially each year.
Asked what new arrangements were, as the retirement age for public sector workers was staying at 60, the PMOS said that the new arrangements were that for new entrants to the civil service, the age would be 65.
Asked in general terms, what was the Prime Minister’s assessment of the national pensions provision, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister had set up a major review under Lord Turner which would report on the 30th November, and it was better to wait until then, rather than give a knee-jerk response!
Asked why did the Prime Minister set up the Turner Report, the PMOS replied that there was a fundamental issue which had to be addressed, given the changing demographics. The demographics were not restricted to this country by any means, as the UK was better placed than others. The PMOS told journalists that when the Welfare State was set up, there were ten people in work for every one in retirement. Now, there were four people in work for every one in retirement, and in fifty years time, that would change to two people in work to every one in retirement.
Asked if the Prime Minister had investigated how other countries had coped with their pensions issues, the PMOS said that again, part of setting up Lord Turner’s Review was to look at the international comparisons.
Education
Asked what the Prime Minister’s view was about the selection of abilities in schools, the PMOS said that as we had expressed this morning, there would be no return to the 11 plus, and what the new White Paper actually did was to strengthen the procedure under which the adjudicator could intervene. The adjudicator’s rulings in future would apply for three years, not one year as at present.
Asked if the Prime Minister felt strongly about the issue, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister had stated on more than one occasion that fair admissions were central in the Government’s policy.
Put to the PMOS that there were other means of selection other than the 11 plus , and perhaps one way of resolving the perceived problem amongst MPs would be to write in the Bill the guarantee given by Ruth Kelly that there would be no return to selection, the PMOS said that when specialist schools were set up, they were allowed to choose ten per cent of pupils for aptitude. Specialist schools had increased from around two hundred to around two thousand five hundred, and the percentage of pupils chosen for aptitude was still only around six per cent, with two thirds of secondary school pupils being educated in specialist schools of one kind or another. People could look at the experience of what the Government had done and see that fair admissions had remained at the centre.
Put to the PMOS that if some form of guarantee was written into the Bill, it would be a case of "throwing the baby out with the bathwater", the PMOS replied that what people should look at was not only what Ministers said, but also the experience of specialist and other schools since the period of reform began. What that experience showed was that what they had done was increase standards, especially where academies had been introduced in deprived areas, whilst keeping to fair admissions.
Put to the PMOS that that had not, so far, appeared to convince many of the rebel backbenchers, the PMOS said that the entire point of the period of debates which Ministers had embarked on was precisely to educate both the public and MPs in the reality of what had happened in the reform programme, rather than the rhetoric of debate as it was sometimes carried out.
Asked who was the current adjudicator, and was it a Government position, the PMOS said that the journalist should speak to the Department for Education for more information.
Asked why the Prime Minister needed to educate his Party about the reforms that were being proposed, considering there had been Party conferences etc, the PMOS said there had been a lot of change since 1997 in the education system, and much of that change had raised standards quite considerably. Equally, however, in the era of globalisation, and in the era as a country we had to raise our skills base, we had to raise standards all the time. That was why there was both the sense that a lot had happened in education, but also, the determination from the Prime Minster and the Education Secretary that we needed to go a lot further. We needed to keep going a lot further, particularly in the deprived communities that in the past had had poor schools. The fact that a lot had been done, and that the education system had delivered a lot of improvements across the board, in the modern globalised world, that was not enough. We had to keep pushing the boundary further forward, because as a country, we had to have to the skills, as the future generation would need to compete in the globalised world.
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