One of the things I am very glad has been written into the national Coalition deal is proper compensation for former Equitable Life policy holders. I must declare an interest here as I had an Equitable Life pension for a few years. In fact its unlikely to be much of an interest as the compensation scheme I have seen proposed is unlikely to give me anything, basically because my loss was relatively small (though painfull nonetheless) and I have time to make alternative provision before I retire. However the experience has illustrated the unfairness of what happened and made me determined to argue for compensation for those who had suffered much more severe losses than me, for no fault of their own.

I still find it surprising that the last Labour Government continually ignored the millions of people who lost their savings, as a result of a clear failure of regulation. Some people lost up to half their pensions in the fiasco, yet the Government failed to act, ignoring the High Court and an Ombudsman report.
The Equitable Life Bill, outlined by the Coalition last week is a massive relief to thousands of pensioners and is long overdue. 

I am delighted that something the Liberal Democrats have been calling for can now finally happen. We are using our position in Government to give policyholders the money they deserve.