Is The Tory Commitment To The Triple Lock A Good Idea?

In what may yet prove a more significant move than his cuts to national insurance, the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, has said the Conservatives will retain the triple lock system to determine annual rises in the state pension if they win the election. Hunt says the pledge will appear in the next Conservative manifesto.

- SEAN O'GRADY

The decision raises some interesting questions...

What’s the triple lock again?

It’s a commitment to increase the level of the state pension applicable to any given individual by either the rate of inflation (as measured by the consumer prices index); the rate at which wages are going up; or 2.5 per cent, whichever is the greater. It has been policy, with one temporary suspension, since 2010, when the idea – which the Liberal Democrats came up with – was incorporated into the policies of the coalition government and the Conservatives adopted it as their own.

Why has Hunt said this now?

That the Tory policy on the triple lock has been decided at this stage suggests that work on the Conservatives’ election manifesto is very far advanced – which implies in turn that a May election was, at one point, a realistic possibility. Now that it isn’t, Hunt has decided to announce the policy anyway and maximise the political advantage it gives him with the “grey vote”. He wants to get the good news out asap.

It also has the effect of once again wrong-footing Labour, who haven’t yet decided what to do and therefore sound evasive when asked to say whether they would match the Tory promise. Keir Starmer will only go as far as to declare: “We will have to see what the state of the economy is as we go into the election. We will publish all of our plans as we go in, and answer that question, but I believe in the triple lock.”