I’ve got this strange vision in my head of Tim Jones of Pada as a quite bright but rather unruly pupil doing everything he can to annoy a new ‘teacher’ name of Nigel Waterson possibly soon to be pensions minister.
The Tata and Pada contract is to be signed before the general election and therefore before the review the Tories plan, if they are elected.
We live in strange times, times of great uncertainty, but one would have expected Pada to have considered all the election outcomes. It is not going to establish enough facts on the ground to make the NEST irreversible, if the Tories don’t want the reform to follow this route. But it would be in danger of costing taxpayers or perhaps future Pada pensioners some money.
I rather think everyone should get at least a little bit cross about this. It must be with the approval of the Government. It will put more strain on that famous consensus. But the real question is why? It isn’t ideology or not really. The debate seems more about tactics. Labour may be a bit more statist, the Conservatives more prepared to involved the pensions industry but is there really a huge difference? Pada is, of course, attached to its project and probably doesn’t want it reviewed and then axed, but it does seem at least a little afflicted by election fever.
