However, this will impose a potentially large transitional cost as younger people cease to pay national-insurance contributions.

ECONOMIST: Pensions: What am I bid? | The

Its introduction carried a transitional cost for the government, as the flow of contributions to the state-run scheme fell.

ECONOMIST: Argentina

The minister stressed however that the Welsh government is not going to commit to pick up the bill by the UK government's decision and the cost of associated redundancy and transitional support lies with them.

BBC: Remploy debate

Earlier on, Labour's Lord Grocott asked the government for its estimates of the cost of running a reformed House of Lords in the first transitional year of its operation.

BBC: No plan for more peers, says Lords leader