Superannuation Bill

The Minister said that he did not want to rehearse the arguments he put up before, but I would invite him to rehearse them because that is where the crucial issue lies. The Minister gave three reasons for having Clause 2. One is as a basis for discussion, which is no basis on which to put anything in legislation. A second is as an interim solution if there is no agreement. As I understand it, once we have Clause 1, there is no necessity for agreement, so there is no necessity for an interim solution. The third item is a fallback, if for some reason the Government were not able to implement an agreement under Clause 1. So we come back to the crucial issue of whether Clause 1 is legally robust. If it is not, on what basis is it not legally robust, or potentially not legally robust? If that is the case, what are the differences between a potential lack of robustness in Clause 1 and a potential lack of robustness in Clause 2, if that is what one has to fall back on? I do not agree with the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie of Luton, that these are punitive caps as I think they are relatively generous compared with what the private sector offers. The Government are indeed prepared to go further and offer a more generous scheme. I have no problem with the quantum but I seek to challenge why we have this clause. If it is just for a basis for discussion, it is no basis on which to legislate. We have to tease out why Clause 1 might be challenged and why Clause 2 would not be challengeable.