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In this blog, policy and public affairs assistant Katy Little discusses the results of the Labour leadership contest and how new leader, Sir Keir Starmer, now has the monumental task of repositioning the party with both party members and the electorate following four consecutive general election losses. Find out more about what policy and personality changes we can expect to see and how these relate to the IFoA’s Key Policy Priorities.

Sir Keir Starmer - Leader of Her Majesty's Official Opposition

Sir Keir Starmer - Leader of Her Majesty's Official Opposition

One event not to be derailed by the COVID-19 pandemic was the Labour Leadership contest, which saw Sir Keir Starmer comfortably win with 56.2 % of the overall vote. His victory comes at a time when the country and the Labour Party both find themselves in a crisis. Internally, the Labour Party continues its identity crisis, unable to shrug off the ghosts of New Labour or find electoral success with the shift to the hard-left under Corbyn. Both factions within the Party never really found peace with one another, and probably never will. That said, Starmer’s Shadow Cabinet appointments thus far suggest a subtle pivot away from Corbynism. All the while, he will have to tread a difficult political line between supporting the government where necessary during this pandemic in the national interest, and also providing effective scrutiny where necessary. 

Labour has now lost four elections in a row and if one thing is certain, Starmer’s goal of returning Labour to office as a united Party will not be easy. He will be joined in this task by the newly elected Deputy Leader – Angela Rayner – who has also taken up the role of Chair of the Labour Party. The first job on their to-do list has been to rearrange the shadow cabinet. With that in mind, the IFoA has been keeping a close eye on shadow frontbench, to see which new personalities we can be expect to be engaging with in the near future, focussing on our three key policy priorities: The Hundred year life, Inclusive Insurance and Sustainability.

Anneliese Dodds – Shadow Chancellor

Anneliese Dodds – Shadow Chancellor

"Insurance is of course incredibly important for the City and the whole country. I understand that the UK insurance market is the fourth largest in the world; it is the largest in Europe by some way. We account for an estimated premium volume of just under £220 billion, according to the latest figures, which are from 2017. It is therefore essential that we get regulation right.”

Anneliese Dodds is the first woman to be appointed to the role of Shadow Chancellor after being promoted from her previous role of Shadow Treasury Minister under Corbyn. Dodds is a former MEP and academic, specialising in public and industrial policy, with a particular interest in housing, NHS, social care and education. Despite being a relatively new MP with no less than 3 years’ experience under her belt, her time spent as Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury will give her a good grounding on the some of the more intricate policy work  that goes on at  the Treasury. She has been most recently responsible for overseeing the scrutiny of secondary legislation relating to the Solvency II directive and the calculation of the personal discount rate; areas which are deeply important to many of our members who work for insurers.

Her new role will place her opposite Rishi Sunak, and her main priority will be scrutinising the economic plans that the Government has put in place since the Budget, to tackle the economic disruption caused by COVID-19.

Jonathan Ashworth – Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care

Jonathan Ashworth – Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care

“We recognise that there will be difficulties delivering social care over the coming weeks and months, but it should not be possible for local authorities to immediately drop care packages to a lower level. As long as it is reasonably practicable to do so, they should continue to meet people’s care needs.”

One of the few people not to be moved in the latest reshuffle has been Jonathan Ashworth, who holds possibly one of the most important roles on the opposition benches at this moment in time. His continuity in this role will add stability to the Labour health team who will have an important role in holding the government to account in its response to COVID-19.

From an actuarial perspective one of the most worrying developments has been the measures within the Coronavirus Act which could leave many individuals without access to care services, and is a further demonstration of the limitations of care provision in the UK. The IFoA has produced a number policy briefings where we assess previously proposed financial products, caps and reforms for social care costs and recommend a solution as a means of social insurance to help individuals adequately prepare for later life. However, the funding of care provision has remained a political hot potato and the failures from government to act in the past is now having serious consequences for individuals in the present.

Jonathan Reynolds – Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions

Jonathan Reynolds – Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions

"We need to get across to the British public a much greater sense of what the (financial services) sector does for them as consumers and what it does for the country. We need to explain that if we have an ageing population and we want to be able to live in retirement with good pension products, that requires an effective asset management industry…I have even tried to push with some Front-Bench colleagues that insurance is a socialist industry: it is about pooling the risks everyone in society faces in a way that shares the burden equitably."

Jonathan is no stranger to the frontbench having held a number of roles including Shadow Justice and Constitutional Affairs Whip, Shadow Minister for Energy and Climate Change and Shadow Economics Secretary, under both Ed Miliband’s and Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. Upon appointment to his new role Reynolds commented that he ‘knows just how big a brief this is to both individuals and the UK economy.’ This is certainly true as the economic implications of COVID-19 has seen more people rely on the welfare state, with record numbers of Universal Credit applications being made in recent weeks.

On pensions, Reynolds has called for “serious long-term thinking," however, it is unclear whether this will correlate to a shift in policy, as there is very little information available on his previous interventions on the subject.  We hope for more clarity in Reynolds’s thinking over the coming months as his voice will be ever more significant when the Pension Schemes Bill is inevitably debated in the Commons.

We also agree that long term view of pensions is necessary to address chronic levels of underserving in the DB generation of workers, and highlights numerous pieces of work the IFoA has completed on retirement adequacy.

The Rt. Hon Ed Miliband, Shadow Business, Energy and Industrial Secretary

The Rt. Hon Ed Miliband, Shadow Business, Energy and Industrial Secretary

“We must return to climate change as the unavoidable long-term issue of our time.”

Ed Miliband has returned to the frontbench and is well-remembered for his time spent as Leader of the Opposition. This appointment speaks volumes as previous backbenchers who were ardently critical of Corbyn’s leadership make the decision to return to the forefront of politics.  

Ed’s new brief will make him responsible for business, industrial strategy, science, innovation, energy and climate change policy. It can be expected that Miliband will have a strong interest with regard to his climate change brief, having previously served as Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change in Brown’s 2010 Government. His time in office saw him drive through the Climate Change Act, which set binding emissions reduction targets for the first time in domestic law. The IFoA has also attended several roundtables in which Ed has spoken on the importance of Green Finance and the role that businesses play in funding the transition to a net zero economy.

This is reassuring from a policy perspective as implementing the Government’s Green Finance Strategy sits at the heart of the IFoA’s research and policy activity as we look to highlight the important role actuaries can play in adapting and mitigating the effect of climate change.

He will also be the shadow responsible for scrutinising the implementation of the Kingman Review and may be a key ally for the IFoA going forward in challenging government policy in this particular area.

Luke Pollard, Shadow Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary

Luke Pollard, Shadow Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary

“Flood Re has resulted in some improvements but it does not insure homes or provide cover for homes built since 2009, and he will know that it does not include support for small businesses, so there are huge holes in the scheme that need to be filled. We need a scheme that works. At the moment, Flood Re is not delivering as was originally intended for all affected communities.”

Luke Pollard is another member who kept his position in the latest reshuffle. This is good news for the IFoA, having met with Luke in 2019 to discuss the future of flood policy, which falls under his shadow ministerial brief. Before COVID-19 took hold of the UK, the devastation caused by floods Dennis and Ciara were at the forefront of policymakers minds, and serious questions were raised about the sustainability and coverage and Flood Re.  The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee subsequently launched an inquiry into flooding and, whilst this issue has been inevitably pushed onto the backburners for the present, in the long-term, the risks associated with flooding have not gone and away. A workable, proactive, long-term strategy for dealing with flood risk needs to be executed in time for Flood Re’s transition plan to be a success for industry and customers. This means dealing with the root causes of flooding, and implementing a strategy that recognises the changing nature of flood events and the potential further impact of more frequent and extreme weather events.


*all photos have been sourced from ©UK Parliament, released under an Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0) licence.