State pension age could be raised to 70 in latest bid to con you out of your rights
I have no idea why this was the image accompanying the BBC’s article. Is it supposed to signify time running out for us all? [Image: Getty Images.]
It isn’t so very long since people were saying the pension age should be lowered, from 65 (for men) and 60 (for women). How times change.
Successive governments decided that they would not be able to afford to pay, so they have been working on ways to force people to work longer, or die quicker.
That’s why so many new jobs have the variable working hours, lack of holiday and sick pay, and most notably lack of pensions that has made Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green so excited recently.
He’s absolutely delighted that fewer people will get to have pensions and will happily increase the age at which people are allowed to draw the cash towards which they’ll have paid for their entire working lives.
It’s a con – all of it. Working-age people now are entitled to the same benefits as the current generation of pensioners.
Note: I didn’t say “should be”. We are entitled to it.
Tories – and other right-wing governments – have tried to steal our rights away from us. For the sake of future generations as well as our own, we should tell them: “No.”
Two separate reports for the government have raised the possibility that millions of people may have to work longer to qualify for a state pension.
An analysis for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has suggested that workers under the age of 30 may not get a pension until the age of 70.
A second report, by John Cridland, proposes that those under the age of 45 may have to work a year longer, to 68.
The government is due to make a decision on both reports by May.
Source: State pension age could be raised to 70, says report – BBC News
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No good talking to a dodgy brick wall; the only thing to do is to demolish it and replace with quality materials.
I wonder if this new pension age will apply to MPs….
None of this will make much difference to the comfortably off who will carry on retiring in their fifties and sixties on private pensions or with capital unlocked early from pension pots or from property and other assets. Only poorer people will be forced to work to the edge of the grave, or possibly forced into long-term unemployment prior to the pension, when they can’t do all the things they used to do well enough to earn a wage, which, of course, costs the government much less than paying a proper pension to individuals.
Cynically the government might up the pension age to 70, say, with people actually ending up finishing their working lives earlier, as before, and having to manage on very low benefits until they reach the new pension age – a much cheaper option for any government than having a realistic earlier retirement age.
Realistically where are all the jobs going to come from to employ elderly people in their sixties? Already one of the biggest groups of unemployed citizens consists of people over fifty. Considering automation and the dearth of decently paid light work for older people right now, it does make me wonder how feasible making people work to 70 will turn out to be. Me? Well if they go ahead with these proposals I reckon all they will spawn will be a very large number of the older jobless, trying to get by on Britain’s very low “working age” benefits.
Nasty stuff.
Very Damien Green.
Great points Roger…..usual Con style of bull in china shop politics rather than thinking it all through properly and applying some common sense logic. Unfortunately the Committees who sit behind the mouth piece announcements are usually politically motivated or also lack common sense.
I wonder if this is not just because “we can’t afford it”, as they always say just before a cut to higher tax rates or a rise in MPs’ pensions etc. If these proposals are carried out it is bound to result in the same sort of animosity by the young towards current pensioners, seen to be much better off, than the Tories have already ingrained in much of the public towards the disabled and indeed anyone on any benefit. More divide and rule tactics?
If the Tories thought they could get away with it they would do away with State Pensions altogether. All part of their plan to go back to the 19th century and it would enable them to give further tax breaks to the very wealthy.
Once again the ol’ Cons are attacking the masses in whittling down their potential future outgoings letting attrition also kick in to save money. Meanwhile the Government and civil servants and local governments have still done diddly squat in addressing their own lavish pensions many of which are still final salary schemes that private companies abandoned many moons ago as totally unaffordable now. A huge saving in these government pensions is sitting there waiting unfortunately these same people are unlikely to vote down what they want for their retirement. Tough action is required now to help save the money that the population just keeps getting the bill for in increased costs and rates. Wakey wakey.
Through their mismanagement we suffer!
Oh how I wish I could claim £300 a day just for showing my face, even if I leave 5 minutes later!
And their ‘guaranteed’ pensions Oh Lordy yes please!
Strange is it not OUR pensions have a big black hole but theirs DON’T!
Fishy fishy fishy!
The Tories have also said that they want to do away with the “triple lock” on pensions, whereby they are guaranteed to increase by a minimum of 2.5% per year, or in line with inflation or wage rises, whichever is highest.
Labour’s Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell has guaranteed to keep this triple lock..
Labour supporters should tell all the pensioners they meet about this, as they tend to vote for the Tories.
Don’t let anybody tell you that demographic shifts mean pensions are not affordable. Hutton has told us that pensions are perfectly affordable.