Civil Partnership (Miscellaneous and Consequential Provisions) Order 2005

I, too, have a great deal of sympathy with the civil servants in the Department for Work and Pensions. For some years, I was my party’s spokesman in your Lordships’ House on pensions. I became all too aware of the immense and ever-increasing complexity of legislation on pensions and I am not surprised that some of the regulations which needed to be changed escaped the attention of the Civil Service. During that time, I became familiar with some of the concepts involved here, such as inherited SERPS, but reference to ““contributions equivalence premium”” is a new one even for me. We strongly supported the Government on the principle of the Civil Partnership Bill, in particular the aim that in financial rights there should be complete equivalence between partners in a civil partnership and married couples. It is clear that these orders work towards that end and that in one respect—that of caring rights—they go somewhat beyond. We are therefore entirely in favour in principle of what lies behind these orders. We are satisfied that they are necessary to achieve the objectives and are happy to support them.