Category Archives: Hansard

My Lords, in the past 12 months, 847 bank branches have closed or are set to close. Four shared banking hubs have opened. Does my noble friend the Minister agree that the Government need to act to ensure local banking provision, including deposit taking as well as withdrawals and advice? They must also act to ensure acceptance of, as well as access to, cash; otherwise, what currency is cash if there is no place to spend it? Finally, will the Government consider carefully commissioning a review into access to digital financial services to ensure that everyone can benefit from all the financial innovations in that space?

My Lords, I declare my financial services interests as set out in the register. Would the Minister agree that, alongside financial literacy, we should also revolutionise the curriculum with data literacy, digital literacy and data privacy literary, to have a curriculum fit for the future and fit for now? Further, would she join with me in congratulating the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans? With the financial literacy initiative from the Church of England, it is clear that the bishop and his colleagues are rightly engaged in both LifeSavers and afterlife savers.

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who participated in this group of amendments. I particularly thank my noble friend the Minister for her full response. Green spaces, inclusive places: we can achieve this and deliver it through statutory design if we so choose. I think we will certainly return to some of these issues, and more, when we get to Report in the autumn, but for now I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 217 withdrawn.

Amendments 218 to 224 not moved.

My Lords, it is pleasure to open this group of amendments. I intend to speak to Amendments 217 and 302 in my name, but I also give more than a supportive nod to the double nelson in the name of my noble friend Lord Lansley. My two amendments are pretty similar in terms but address two specific areas. They simply require that, whether we are talking about local plans or planning more broadly, they should be predicated on the principle of “inclusive by design”.

Let me share a small example to make this point. A number of years ago, so-called shared space became popular among local authorities. I say “so-called” shared space, because in reality it was nothing of the sort—some might say it was a planning folly. In effect, it was where previously inclusive and accessible public realm was converted into “shared space”. Let us take a carriageway, for example. Shared space came in and removed kerbstones, road markings, pavements, crossings and lights, and then pedestrians, tankers, toddlers and buses were all supposed to share that space, with everybody paying more respect to one another. As I say, some may say that it was a planning folly. There are still examples across the country, some not that far from your Lordships’ House.

Had we had the principle of “inclusive by design” underpinning public realm, underpinning planning and underpinning—as in this Bill—local plans, we would not have had such designs which exclude so many people from the local community who were previously able to access those areas independently. Had we had “inclusive by design” as a planning principle, with everything predicated on it, we would not have had such “shared spaces” and we would not have inaccessible, non-inclusive areas across our public realms, across our cities and across our communities.

I wrote a report in 2015 on “shared space” and it saw that over two-thirds of people found it difficult if not impossible to navigate. “Inclusive by design” is a key planning principle. It is not just for disabled people or just about access; it is about the very heart, soul and fabric of our local areas—inclusive by design so that they can be accessed, enjoyed and passed through by all members of our community. That is what my Amendments 217 and 302 are all about. I beg to move.

My Lords, I welcome my noble friend to the Front Bench and declare my technology interest. Does he agree that data is completely pervasive and all around us, that data literacy is critical and should be taught from the kindergarten right through life, and that data privacy is a key element of such data literacy teaching?

My Lords, I welcome my noble friend to the Front Bench and declare my technology interest. Does he agree that data is completely pervasive and all around us, that data literacy is critical and should be taught from the kindergarten right through life, and that data privacy is a key element of such data literacy teaching?

To ask His Majesty’s Government what plans they have to designate data, digital, and financial literacy as compulsory subjects in primary and secondary schools in England.

In asking my Question on the Order Paper, I declare my technology interests as set out in the register.

My Lords, does my noble friend agree, considering so many of the challenges facing particularly our young people in online and offline situations, that it would be helpful to do more than encourage effective quality data on digital and financial literacy—not just through school but throughout life? That would be beneficial not just to young people but to all people.

My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this Second Reading debate and, in doing so, I declare my financial services interests as set out in the register. I congratulate Mary Robinson on securing this Private Member’s Bill: it is the model of what a Private Member’s Bill should do. My noble friend Lord Young said in his excellent introduction that it was specific and effective—and it is certainly that. Again, congratulations to Mary Robinson, my noble friend Lord Young and everybody who has helped in the preparation of the Bill to get it to this stage.

Pensions have somewhat lost their sheen since perhaps the 1970s, when my noble friend Lord Young spoke about them, yet, when you look at what is behind a pension, it still makes sense today. It is still a positive proposition to have something separate from the employer, protected by a trust structure, to set you up for your retirement. But, since the development of pensions, in relatively recent history, Equitable, Maxwell, Brown and other issues have taken the sheen off that pensions promise—but they should not. Perhaps there is a need for a great big branding exercise to be done.

Auto-enrolment has certainly played its part: perhaps we should all consider how best to rebrand what is fundamentally a very positive proposition for people to connect and commit to as early as possible in their working lives to ensure that security when they reach the age of retirement, be that 65, 66, 67, 68—or whenever that may come to all of us. To my noble friends the Minister and Lord Young, I say: should we not consider effective means to increase our efforts to promote the whole proposition of pensions as a positive means, which is potentially in need of rethinking but essentially a very good thing to have as part of our society and economy?

Moving to the issue at hand of dashboards, the simple and effective measure in the Bill is just that. Will my noble friend Lord Young or the Minister confirm that it simply brings into line the proposition which runs through all pensions legislation when it comes to the behaviour of trustees in such situations, so it is a clear and obvious reset of what the 2021 Act did not include? The great possibilities of pensions dashboards are in what we are able to do with data. If we have clear and coherent data and people are able to have it in real time on their devices, that can only be a positive thing, if the right levels of education, communication and understanding can also be put into that mix.

As my noble friend Lady Altmann asked: what is being done to ensure that that data is robust, reliable, consistent and the complete picture? It is true in this instance, but also across all that we may be able to do in fintech with the new technologies we have available to us, that it is only as good as the quality of the data that underpins it, and dashboards are the obvious, clear example in front of us today. That data point is critical to consider at every point to ensure that, when an individual looks at their dashboard, they can know that that is the real-time, accurate representation of what they hold across all their pension pots.

Finally, on the question of digital ID, again it is pertinent in this instance, as it is to everything we seek to do in a digital economy for the UK. None of this will work effectively unless we get to grips with digital ID. So is the Minister satisfied with the progress we are making on digital ID for the UK? Where are we currently and where will the responsibility for digital ID rest, with the changing departmental structure across Whitehall? Can he urge ministerial colleagues to further increase the pace in this digital ID work, because it is critical to so much of what we are trying to achieve? It must be secure, it must be reliable, it must cover all the issues around privacy, and we still have quite a journey to cover on that issue.

To conclude, again I offer congratulations to my noble friend Lord Young and Mary Robinson. This is a specific, clear and effective Private Member’s Bill. I wish it swift, safe speed into statute.