Rachel Reeves has been forced to correct the official parliamentary record after giving MPs and peers inaccurate figures on both unemployment and her flagship pension reforms, prompting renewed questions over her command of economic detail.
The Treasury confirmed that Hansard, the record of parliamentary proceedings, had been amended following errors made by the Chancellor during committee hearings.
In one exchange, Reeves told MPs that the £425bn Local Government Pension Scheme was managed by “96 different administering authorities” and that she intended to cut this down to “eight pools” under her reforms to boost investment and efficiency. Officials later conceded the true figures were 86 authorities and a planned consolidation into six pools.
She also misquoted labour market data during an appearance before the House of Lords economic affairs committee, saying that “20% of people of working age are economically inactive and we have an unemployment rate of just over 4%.” The Treasury clarified that the Office for National Statistics (ONS) puts economic inactivity at 21% and the unemployment rate at 4.7%.
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