John Hutton to lead public sector pensions commission
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Former Labour Work and Pensions Secretary John Hutton is to lead an independent commission into the future for public sector pensions.
Chancellor George Osborne announced Hutton’s appointment over the weekend to bring a “cross-party perspective” to a “national problem”.
Hutton was Work and Pensions Secretary between November 2005 and June 2007 and famously raised concerns about the prospect of Gordon Brown becoming Prime Minister.
However, he continued to serve under Brown, as Business Secretary from June 2007 to October 2008 and Defence Secretary until June 2009 when he quit the Cabinet.
Hutton did not stand at the general election and has recently joined the board at US energy company Hyperion Power Generation.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr show on BBC 1 on Sunday morning, Osborne said: “The public sector pension bill is unsustainable, and the Office for Budget Responsibility, this independent office which we’ve created, has shown this, and we do have to tackle it. But again I want to do this in a way which everyone feels that they’ve had a chance to contribute, that they’ve had their say, so we’re going to be establishing an independent pensions commission.
“(Hutton) is a man with real intelligence and knowledge in this area, I think he’s going to bring a cross-party perspective to what is a national problem, and means this is not going to be done on a partisan basis.”
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