Browse content similar to 29/04/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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And in the South: The local government pension scheme | :01:29. | :01:32. | |
was already a hot potato even before a pressure group claimed it | :01:32. | :01:42. | |
:01:42. | :01:42. | ||
Apology for the loss of subtitles for 1677 seconds | :01:42. | :29:40. | |
Welcome to Sunday Politics South. On today's show: The local | :29:40. | :29:42. | |
government pension scheme was already a hot potato even before a | :29:42. | :29:47. | |
pressure group claimed it is facing a massive deficit. We will hear | :29:47. | :29:50. | |
from the unlikely bedfellows of a union organiser and a Conservative | :29:50. | :29:54. | |
council leader as to why they think that is wrong. | :29:54. | :29:58. | |
More on that later. First, though, let's meet the two politicians who | :29:58. | :30:01. | |
will be with me for the next 20 minutes. Lord Chidgey was the | :30:01. | :30:04. | |
Liberal Democrat MP for Eastleigh for 11 years until the 2005 | :30:04. | :30:07. | |
election. And Tobias Ellwood is the Conservative MP for Bournemouth | :30:07. | :30:17. | |
:30:17. | :30:19. | ||
East. Will you work closely read Jeremy Hunt. I was the shadow | :30:19. | :30:24. | |
tourism minister in that time. is in a difficult position. How | :30:24. | :30:29. | |
well his character stand up to it? He is valued as a member of the | :30:29. | :30:33. | |
Cabinet and gave a great performance in the Commons making a | :30:33. | :30:38. | |
statement. He has provided more information today and has said that | :30:38. | :30:43. | |
he will come forward to discuss this. This is something the media | :30:43. | :30:52. | |
is focusing on just now. It is a lot of pressure on an individual. | :30:52. | :31:02. | |
Yes, I think he can. I think it will be interesting to see what | :31:02. | :31:06. | |
relationship the wars between the special adviser and Jeremy Hunt. We | :31:06. | :31:12. | |
all want to have the facility of special advisers helping us, but | :31:12. | :31:18. | |
what exactly is their role and how far can they go? A lot of Lib Dems | :31:18. | :31:25. | |
are upset about this. As there is as semi-private world in government, | :31:25. | :31:30. | |
if I may say now that I am experiencing it, were you have the | :31:30. | :31:36. | |
money and resources to pay people to be a special advisers. I think | :31:36. | :31:45. | |
this becomes a rather closed world. There is more transparency? With | :31:45. | :31:51. | |
every single decision that had to be made by Jeremy Hunt, he took the | :31:51. | :31:57. | |
advice of independent advisers. It is the Cabinet member who makes the | :31:57. | :32:01. | |
decisions. He has been very clear about that. | :32:01. | :32:06. | |
It is the local elections on Thursday. If you were watching the | :32:06. | :32:08. | |
programme last week, we were talking to the UK Independence | :32:08. | :32:11. | |
Party about their electoral chances. This week we are talking to the | :32:11. | :32:14. | |
Greens. Caroline Lucas, the party leader and MP for Brighton Pavilion, | :32:14. | :32:19. | |
joins us now from our Brighton studio. No election in Brighton | :32:19. | :32:24. | |
this year, but you're putting candidates up in other places in | :32:24. | :32:31. | |
the South? We are. A quarter of seats nationwide have candidates | :32:31. | :32:37. | |
from the Green Party. We're looking at Reading where we have two Green | :32:38. | :32:43. | |
members. Also other places per we want a stronger foothold across the | :32:43. | :32:47. | |
South East. So much of the debate is about the economy. Green | :32:47. | :32:52. | |
candidates will be talking about spending more taxpayers' money. | :32:52. | :32:56. | |
They will say that bike investing in the Green economy, you can | :32:56. | :33:03. | |
create jobs. Want to promote insulation and people's homes. End | :33:03. | :33:12. | |
in Kirklees, we had a scheme where insulation was rolled out across | :33:12. | :33:18. | |
60,000 homes. That created jobs and helped people. It is all about | :33:19. | :33:24. | |
subsidy and public spending. The public is not in a mood to hear | :33:24. | :33:29. | |
that. I think the public does want to you about how they can save | :33:29. | :33:34. | |
money in their bills. As people have an interest in Green issues | :33:34. | :33:39. | |
and we can create jobs. There was a survey this week saying that people | :33:39. | :33:46. | |
are less interested in politics than in the last 10 years. Can you | :33:46. | :33:52. | |
capitalise on that disenchantment? There is a huge potential. There is | :33:52. | :33:57. | |
a disillusionment with the three main parties. They are increasingly | :33:57. | :34:02. | |
indistinguishable. That is worse with a coalition government. People | :34:02. | :34:05. | |
are looking for a stronger alternative, so when you have a | :34:05. | :34:11. | |
party that is nationally in tune with public opinion when it comes | :34:11. | :34:15. | |
to challenging the privatisation of public services and renewing | :34:15. | :34:20. | |
nuclear weapons, the Greens are more in tune with public opinion, | :34:20. | :34:24. | |
and what we are finding is that once they get at first Green | :34:24. | :34:27. | |
councillor on the council, the light get and they want more of | :34:27. | :34:37. | |
:34:37. | :34:40. | ||
some. -- more of them. You are indistinguishable in government and | :34:40. | :34:46. | |
it is turning people off. To hear this accusation is very interesting. | :34:46. | :34:51. | |
There are huge differences in where become from from a party | :34:51. | :34:55. | |
perspective. We have had to come together because of the mess the | :34:56. | :34:59. | |
last Labour government left us in. That is why we have been called | :34:59. | :35:05. | |
upon to sort out the deficit. Clearly there will -- there will be | :35:05. | :35:10. | |
some overlap between the three parties. We are succeeding in | :35:10. | :35:20. | |
:35:20. | :35:26. | ||
getting the country back on that its feet. As you know, I am a | :35:26. | :35:28. | |
Shadow Minister for International Development end their Foreign | :35:28. | :35:36. | |
Office in Africa and I meet their ministers every week. It is no easy | :35:36. | :35:44. | |
ride in Cabinet. When there is disagreement, it is rough. It is | :35:44. | :35:49. | |
not a nice cosy tea party, it is a very robust and often volatile | :35:49. | :35:55. | |
political discussion of argument. You are for getting the result of | :35:55. | :35:58. | |
the last general election. There was not a clear winner so there is | :35:58. | :36:03. | |
not a mandate for any single party to do any single thing. Therefore | :36:03. | :36:07. | |
there is a requirement for two parties to morph together for a | :36:07. | :36:13. | |
period to meet the challenges of the day. Was that a mid-term | :36:13. | :36:23. | |
protest? I think people who voted Liberal Democrat are very upset. | :36:23. | :36:27. | |
When you see at Lib Dems especially -- essentially selling out over | :36:27. | :36:34. | |
tuition fees and the NHS, they thought they were getting a radical | :36:34. | :36:44. | |
:36:44. | :36:46. | ||
alternative. Can I say something about the economy? But if you vote | :36:46. | :36:49. | |
for the Greens, you might take away some of the votes for one of the | :36:49. | :36:56. | |
bigger parties. Labour first introduced tuition fees. You are | :36:56. | :37:00. | |
exactly demonstrating the critiques that so many people have of this | :37:00. | :37:07. | |
tea-parties from outside of Westminster. Can I say something | :37:07. | :37:16. | |
about the cuts? I wanted to say that there is an absolute consensus | :37:16. | :37:19. | |
with the three main parties at the best way of tackling the deficit is | :37:19. | :37:24. | |
to cut more and more. If Government starts to stop spending, that gets | :37:24. | :37:29. | |
us into a worse recession, as we can see with this at double-dip | :37:29. | :37:38. | |
recession. We need to spend money and grow. If we use the money of | :37:38. | :37:42. | |
quantitative easing to invest in jobs, that is how you get out of | :37:42. | :37:45. | |
recession. One of the biggest points of | :37:45. | :37:48. | |
friction between the Government and public sector workers is over their | :37:48. | :37:51. | |
pensions. The Government reckons there need to be changes to cut | :37:51. | :37:53. | |
costs, the unions, not surprisingly, are resisting that vigorously. But | :37:53. | :37:56. | |
now a pressure group has waded into the row to claim that councils | :37:56. | :37:59. | |
across the country are facing deficits of millions of pounds each | :37:59. | :38:08. | |
on the local government pension scheme. | :38:09. | :38:13. | |
With just over 5 million members, the local government pension scheme | :38:13. | :38:18. | |
is one of the largest of its kind in the country. It is made up of | :38:18. | :38:25. | |
100 funds independently managed by its representatives from that | :38:25. | :38:29. | |
theory are. Sounds as safe as houses, but not according to the | :38:29. | :38:33. | |
TaxPayers' Alliance. Pension reform has been a political hot potato for | :38:33. | :38:39. | |
some time. With talk of gold-plated retirement for public sector | :38:39. | :38:45. | |
workers while an increasing number of private sector companies close | :38:45. | :38:53. | |
their final salary pension schemes. Now a black hole of �54 billion has | :38:53. | :39:00. | |
been found by the TaxPayers' Alliance. While the assets they are | :39:00. | :39:06. | |
holding might rise, it looks as though there is a genuine gap which | :39:06. | :39:13. | |
cannot be filled by yet more burdens on taxpayers as council tax | :39:13. | :39:18. | |
payers are already paying more than enough for. In the South, report | :39:18. | :39:22. | |
claims that the pension scheme for Dorset County Council has a deficit | :39:22. | :39:29. | |
of just over �300 million. Hampshire County Council has the | :39:29. | :39:35. | |
third highest deficit all local authorities. �700 million. Just how | :39:35. | :39:39. | |
worried should we really be about this warning from the TaxPayers' | :39:39. | :39:46. | |
Alliance? It is rather like saying to someone with a mortgage that you | :39:46. | :39:55. | |
have a black hole in your bank account of �100,000. In fact, he or | :39:55. | :40:03. | |
she has 25 years in which to pay off that �100,000 mortgage. So it | :40:03. | :40:09. | |
is an unfair snapshot and I do wish the TaxPayers' Alliance would stop | :40:09. | :40:14. | |
being so sensational about this. Local government pension schemes | :40:14. | :40:19. | |
are very important to very many people, including the council tax | :40:19. | :40:25. | |
payer. Hampshire County Council says it is just a calculation made | :40:25. | :40:31. | |
on paper by accountants. Unions are equally frustrated. They say the | :40:31. | :40:36. | |
TaxPayers' Alliance need to get its facts straight. If you look at the | :40:36. | :40:42. | |
Hampshire pension scheme, it is �16 million in profit and has �4 | :40:42. | :40:47. | |
million in assets. This is not a pension scheme in problem. But they | :40:47. | :40:54. | |
ignore these facts and start to make up their own. No one -- not | :40:54. | :41:00. | |
everyone will retire on the same day. We saw some financial advice. | :41:00. | :41:06. | |
I don't think anybody should be scared. This is of concern. If it | :41:06. | :41:10. | |
was just one county council that had a deficit, you should be | :41:10. | :41:14. | |
worried. The simple fact is most pension schemes are in deficit at | :41:14. | :41:20. | |
the present time and that the stock market moves out of recession or | :41:20. | :41:25. | |
the diptych is in, the deficits will start to be reduced. I don't | :41:25. | :41:30. | |
think there is anything particularly to worry about -- the | :41:30. | :41:38. | |
debt it is in. We are all living longer and pensions must reflect | :41:38. | :41:45. | |
this. If we want to maintain its generous public sector pensions, | :41:46. | :41:51. | |
for more generous than most people in the private-sector, then we're | :41:51. | :42:00. | |
going to have to see those workers paying more for them. We will put a | :42:00. | :42:07. | |
proposal to Our members later in the year. It might include people | :42:07. | :42:12. | |
working longer and paying more money into pensions. We don't need | :42:12. | :42:15. | |
the TaxPayers' Alliance putting out bogus report and sticking their | :42:15. | :42:20. | |
nose in just because they don't want the scheme to exist at all. | :42:20. | :42:26. | |
toxic issue which has already led to industrial action. Where do you | :42:27. | :42:31. | |
stand? I spoke to the Local Government Association before the | :42:31. | :42:36. | |
programme because this is complicated. There are 100 | :42:36. | :42:40. | |
government pension schemes across the country. On balance, schemes | :42:40. | :42:50. | |
:42:50. | :42:52. | ||
are in profit. Is this like having a mortgage? It is. The whole point | :42:52. | :43:02. | |
:43:02. | :43:03. | ||
is that over the last 12 months, 54 billion was the total claimed the | :43:03. | :43:11. | |
scheme was a in deficit, but 37 billion has been accrued through it | :43:11. | :43:17. | |
rises in the stock market. In one year, 37 billion has been paid in. | :43:17. | :43:22. | |
They are saying there is a 54 billion deficit over all. It won't | :43:22. | :43:28. | |
take long to get back in balance. We must protect the pensions of the | :43:28. | :43:33. | |
lower paid. They are vulnerable and we have to be fair and make choices | :43:33. | :43:36. | |
to have some flexibility on how we deal with them. Those are the real | :43:36. | :43:44. | |
issues. I find myself in agreement with the trade union on that point. | :43:44. | :43:49. | |
This is a snapshot of the financial affairs right now. Those pension | :43:49. | :43:58. | |
schemes have not matured and so you cannot take the sums as they are. | :43:58. | :44:02. | |
Had the TaxPayers' Alliance spoken to Bournemouth Borough Council, | :44:02. | :44:06. | |
they would have got a more complete picture of the state of affairs | :44:06. | :44:12. | |
rather than this snapshot. George Osborne and this Government is | :44:12. | :44:16. | |
taking robust action because it was John Prescott who avoided this | :44:16. | :44:24. | |
issue because he is so close to the unions. In 1997, the cost to the | :44:24. | :44:31. | |
taxpayer of all these council pensions was �2 billion. That has | :44:32. | :44:37. | |
now raised to 6 billion. We cannot go on like this. People are living | :44:37. | :44:44. | |
10 years longer than they were a few decades ago. This will hurt the | :44:44. | :44:50. | |
low paid. We will not. The new system that comes and will not | :44:50. | :44:58. | |
affect people earning less than 21,000. It is rated so that people | :44:58. | :45:06. | |
on large salaries, such as those who lead unions, will take a big | :45:06. | :45:14. | |
hit. We have introduced these tough decisions, as well as increasing | :45:14. | :45:18. | |
the age of retirement. Now our regular round-up of the | :45:18. | :45:27. | |
political week in the South in 60 seconds. | :45:27. | :45:30. | |
The Labour leader Ed Miliband kicked off the week with a visit to | :45:31. | :45:36. | |
Reading ahead of the local elections. At Leek Town College, | :45:36. | :45:42. | |
students turned out to hear him declare yet unemployment a massive | :45:42. | :45:47. | |
emergency. British Gas cut 550 jobs at a Southampton call centre. | :45:47. | :45:54. | |
Everyone was crying. I might never work again. At the with HSBC, | :45:54. | :46:01. | |
Zurich Insurance and other companies, total job losses in the | :46:01. | :46:06. | |
South came to 1,500. He Employment Minister tried to offer some | :46:06. | :46:11. | |
reassurance. There are opportunities for people who need | :46:11. | :46:18. | |
to get back into work. It has been a gloomy week. To cheer us up, the | :46:18. | :46:22. | |
children of the school had a positive attitude to their new ball | :46:22. | :46:32. | |
:46:32. | :46:33. | ||
at -- solar panels. It might not be sunny, but we will still get energy. | :46:33. | :46:43. | |
:46:43. | :46:45. | ||
Everyone in the collision -- the coalition must be concerned. | :46:45. | :46:50. | |
have just had a drop in unemployment. There is an increase | :46:50. | :46:53. | |
in the number of people in the private sector which is | :46:53. | :47:01. | |
compensating for the loss of jobs in the public sector. More people | :47:01. | :47:07. | |
have come into the private sector than those who have lost their jobs | :47:07. | :47:13. | |
in the public sector. Will people be feeling good about what | :47:13. | :47:17. | |
Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have done with that economy? There | :47:17. | :47:21. | |
is a long haul here and we have more to do to move the economy | :47:21. | :47:28. | |
forward. We should be careful about opinion polls now. I remember the | :47:28. | :47:35. | |
1980s and 1990s when Neil Kinnock got 50% poll ratings from -- | :47:35. | :47:45. | |
:47:45. | :47:47. | ||
ratings. Yet he did not win. remember the St p b n on 45%. But | :47:47. | :47:57. | |
:47:57. | :48:01. | ||
then we had a war in the Falkland Isles. -- the SDP. There was also | :48:01. | :48:07. | |
Margaret Thatcher. I have been through several recessions and it | :48:07. | :48:15. | |
is not easy. I have seen one million people long-term unemployed | :48:15. | :48:23. | |
over one year. 25% unemployment in Spain just now. We must not make | :48:23. | :48:33. | |
:48:33. | :48:36. | ||
the mistakes of the past. We have to invest in training and skills. | :48:36. | :48:43. | |
Our present workforce is a badly under skilled. It is all very well | :48:43. | :48:47. | |
having apprenticeship schemes, but they have to be properly designed | :48:47. | :48:52. | |
so that people can compete worldwide. Financial services are | :48:52. | :49:02. | |
:49:02. | :49:06. | ||
no answer. You are always optimistic. We have a worse deficit | :49:06. | :49:10. | |
than Spain and look at their unemployment rate. Our unemployment | :49:10. | :49:15. | |
levels are dropping. Their situation -- our situation was | :49:16. | :49:25. | |
:49:26. | :49:28. | ||
worse than their us in 2008. their's. | :49:28. | :49:32. | |
That is the Sunday Politics in the South. Thanks to my guests, Lord | :49:32. | :49:34. | |
Chidgey and Tobias Ellwood. There will be coverage of the local | :49:34. | :49:38. |