Malcolm McLean, Senior Consultant at Barnett Waddingham, does not expect pensions to feature much, he said; “It will be interesting to see if anything on pensions from the Conservative’s recent election manifesto will be carried forward. As a minority government, they will naturally be concerned to avoid significant areas of controversy. This could mean they drop both of their original proposals to end the state pension triple lock from 2020 and to introduce means-testing to the universal winter fuel payment.
“It is also likely that changes to social care arrangements, dubbed the “dementia tax”, will be shelved. If, as expected, the Government does not respond to the Cridland Report, and brings forward changes to the state pension age within the next government term, there will be no need for the Queen to refer to this in the Queen’s Speech.
“Presumably there will need to be a new over-arching Finance Bill, which could include the items dropped at the last minute from the previous Bill, curtailed to ensure it passed into law before the election campaign began. These include the reduction in the Money Purchase Annual Allowance from £10,000 to £4,000 and an increased Financial Advice Allowance. There will also be a need to bring forward legislation to ban cold-calling for pension scams.
“It is possible that provision will be made for a new Social Security Bill for any necessary changes to Defined Benefit Pension Schemes following the recent Green Paper. However, at this stage it is unlikely that the detailed content can or will be set out.
“Given the legislative demands of Brexit, the Great Repeal Bill, and the fact most commentators do not expect the new parliament to run for a full five year term, this could be one of the quietest Queen’s Speech on pensions for many years.”
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