Speeches by Ali.

“I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and the Minister responsible for introducing this Bill. I am proud to have worked on these important proposals in government and remain determined to ensure that we protect, renew and enhance our democracy. Our democracy has inspired people and movements around…”

“This conflict has already cost lives. Civilians are caught in the crossfire, and hundreds of thousands of UK nationals are stranded in the region. If it continues for weeks, that will only make it more difficult to evacuate our nationals, and it will cause a humanitarian catastrophe and damage to the world economy. Can…”

“Does it undermine what you and the Government are trying to do?”

“On the intelligence unit, you mentioned a number of things that you want to measure, which is really helpful. Do you see it also measuring savings to employers in the public and private sectors, if the data is used to look at how employers are using that data to get better outcomes?”

“Turning to older people, do you think we need a dedicated piece of work to develop an older worker strategy, not least given that disability is a big issue but also, post-pandemic, there are issues around not enough over-50s returning to the labour market and, of course, age discrimination.”

“You don’t want scope creep.”

“Agreed. The other role that the intelligence unit is due to play is designing incentives for employers. You have touched on that. What incentives are you looking at first?”

“My questions are partly on the intelligence unit. Before I go on to that, I want to pick up on the Access to Work point. On a visit this week, we took evidence from young people with disabilities returning to work in Durham. In some cases, there are well-documented examples that it can take many months, up to a year or…”

“My final question is about enforcement. Obviously, you are focusing on the positive engagement with employers, but there will be areas where there needs to be enforcement of equalities legislation, for instance. What are your thoughts on that?”

“Could we make it more quickfire? Chris and others, do you all agree that we should have an older worker strategy?”

“As we have discussed, the Mayfield review is a seven-year programme, yet the state pension age starts to rise to 67 in April. We have had evidence from those who are in that period of transition, as well as those who were either made redundant or, for different reasons, have left employment earlier, and so on. Building…”

“It needs to be fixed.”

“It is about enabling good practice.”

“Is what is available appropriate, or does there need to be more, better guidance?”

“Do you know?”

“Are immediate living costs what is driving it?”

“Of policymakers of those who are on low incomes who are drawing on their pensions.”

“Good morning. We know that improvements in life expectancy have stalled and healthy life expectancy has reduced, and that trend is likely to continue. What should this mean for the state pension age?”

“This question is to Tiffany first. Picking up on the pensioners who draw down their pensions as soon as they are allowed to and who are on low incomes, how much understanding is there among policy makers about what is driving that and the extent to which it is being done to deal with immediate living costs?”

“Tiffany and Justin, researchers from Southampton University told us that Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities are less likely to take part in workplace pensions. Could you say a bit about work that you have done on this issue and whether DWP or industry has done any work on it to understand how it can be addressed? Ar…”