Greg Kingston - No need to raise the retirement age
09:14 | 03 Jul 2009
Just pay a higher flat rate pension at 68, and drop the means-tested benefits system that costs far more to manage than it actually pays out.
Then drop final salary pensions across the entire public sector.
With those cost savings, the retirement age could probably be brought back down to 65 by 2050...
But above all, stop meddling with pensions, tweaking here, pondering there. Appoint a neutral pension body, outside of political influence, and let them decide.
Paul B - Public Sector Pensions are the problem
09:31 | 03 Jul 2009
It is just not on to raise the retirement age and leave the public sector pension age unchanged.
When weighing up the value of a career in the public sector against the private sector the pension would have been a prime consideration. One would have weighed up the benefits, but this would have been done assuming the retirement age was 65 for men and 60 for women.
I don't she how the retirement age can keep being raised, however the public section retirement ages can't. In some cases people can retire in their early 50s. Why should everyone else have to work longer to pay for this.
We will have a two tier society.
William Harrow - priority!
09:44 | 03 Jul 2009
We need to sort out the Public sector charity first of all!! once this has been brought into line we can plan for a more equal society; the thought that one section of workers can retire at 60 with a massive state funded protected pension is just inflammatory and totally unjust!
W.A.Harrow
Catherine Bromley
09:52 | 03 Jul 2009
There is already a two tier system and again it is a case of flog the work horse until it dies, the people making these ridiculous proposals for retirement age don't have to work manually or scrape by to earn enough to live. They are not ravaged by ill health because they can't afford private health to diagnose and cure bodies that are tired and worn out from working all their lives. They have big fat pensions and outrageous salaries given to them for making decisions that don't affect them! it would be interesting to hear their retirement plans!
Nick Cotton - Off with his head!
09:54 | 03 Jul 2009
Lord Turner's credibility is waning. He should stop fiddling with numbers and recognise that even if people want to work to age 70, in most cases the opportunity for them to do so does not exist. During their working lives, people do have to make provision for their retirement and expect to draw on their pension pot from age 60, not 70, not 80, not 90 nor 100.
Lord Turner is aiming to reduce and maybe extinguish pension liability altogether. He is just another unelected fat cat deciding what is best for the government rather than promulgating a pension system which is fair and reasonable to all. The system is arbitrary, but this man is just playing with beans and he is lucky someone is willing to pay him to do that. I cannot afford the luxury!
ronald jones - Pension and raising retirement age
09:58 | 03 Jul 2009
Most public sector workers considered seriously wether working outside under normal conditions in the private sector, normally would receive lower salaries. Most considered the benefits of contrbution to a final salary pension scheme as against being in the private sector. Most cases the public sector workers forgo lower salaries because they were to benefit from a final salary scheme. These schemes were part of your conditions of emplyment, and don't forget employees contributed to these pensions, therefore it is justified that they should receive their final salary pensions accordingly. It is no good private sector workers to cry wolf, they have mostly benefited from higher salaries over many years.It is pathetic that Adiar turner should majke statements like this, he should get on and put his own house in order within the FSA who are utterly incompetant, just talke the Aviva reatribution scam as a case.
Mike - Easy for him to say
10:00 | 03 Jul 2009
Very easy for him to say that we should all work until we're 70 with a measly state pension at the end of it.
He on the other hand will retire, probably at 50, with a huge public sector pension, topped up with lavish additional amounts from various directorships.
Only when the public sector gets off their own gravy train and does some real work in the real world will anyone listen to them.
Spongebob - Public Sector -v- Private Sector
10:17 | 03 Jul 2009
I think this is a smoke screen. There is a suggestion that people choose public sector employment to take advantage of good pension provision and accepting that their pay won't be as attractive. This may be true in some cases but it's far easier to find manual work with poor pay and conditions (and little or no retirement provision) in the private sector. Who's going to help those people?? Especially when many jobs require significant physical effort which is clearly more difficult the older you get. Fine for us desk wallahs to carry on until 70, but not so good for a hod carrier - what about them Lord Turner?
alan - kill them off
10:18 | 03 Jul 2009
what a good idea from a pen pusher .
raise the age to 70
that will kill off most of the working class ,then that will leave all the goverment pension pot for the poor pen pushes like bankers .mp/s.doctors.and all the rest of the very well paid goverment top nobs.
i bet this was wrote by some one who would not even need his state pension when he retires.
Grumpy Old Man - Life Expectancy
10:37 | 03 Jul 2009
Life expectancy is rising is it.?....What that really means for many people is expect a longer life of work and poverty ,unless you are in the public sector of course.
The next Government has to grasp the public sector pension nettle and bring those priviledged hoardes into the real world with the rest of us.Besides their gold plated pensions,they also cost a fortune in 'sick pay' and take far more time off than the private sector employee during the course of the year.The whole mentality of the public sector worker has to be changed....from top to bottom.Get that sorted and perhaps there may not be the need to raise the pension age to 70.I have to say that so many good points have been raised by posters,that I nearly just wrote 'hear hear'!!!
Nevertheless,I have to say that I am heartily sick of being lectured to on every subject under the sun by self important Government stooges all protected from the harsh realities of life that most of us have to cope with....just get out of my life!
Bernard Keeffe - Present retirement age for a few
10:42 | 03 Jul 2009
Trade Union leaders retire at 55 on full pension. How many former union officials such as Alan Johnson sitting in the HofC have pensions or other golden links with their former employers?
Civil servants and established BBC staff retire at 60, though how many of those are left I don't know, for John Birt and Greg Dyke bound their new staff with gold chains in the form of a short-term contract; the present top Marks have spread this across the corporation and destroyed producer independence.
The concept of a retirement age came in with the 20th century. During research on strikes in the late Victorian era, I was amazed to read that the Police Inspector dealing with a mass demo in Trafalgar Square around 1880 was 72-years old.
LLoyd George's Old Age Pension of 1909 was 5s at age 70 and was means-tested.
Fitness for work in advancing years depends largely on physical condition. A judge is reckoned fit for work far older than say a miner or a postman. Would you feel happy with a 70-year old airline pilot? Police and firefighters retire I believe in their late 50s.
The tedium of many white-collar jobs can lead to decreasing concentration and commitment.
Advances in technology have already produced widespread unemployment in lower-paid employment - former miners filling super-market shelves. How many middle-managers recently made redundant in their late 40s will find work again in a harsher down-sized cost- conscious economy?
The glib proposals of a new public servant,.no doubt well-paid, who will have substantial pensions from his former top jobs in industry, are hardly to be taken seriously.
Patrick Allan Moore - Get Real!
10:43 | 03 Jul 2009
I am 64, very fit and lucky enough to be in reasonable health but when it comes to manual labour I know that a full day's work bending, shifting and lifting will cause me problems the next day.
I totally agree that Turner, fat cat and dubious authority on any work let alone real work, is talking through his well polished backside even for folks who will be enjoying their increased longevity in 2050.
Another Labour Luvvie with a masters in the art of troughing while the rest of us eat s..t!
Come back George Orwell and enjoy the dramatisation of your Animal Farm and 1984 epics courtesy of producers Brown and his similarly nosed brothers!
We need retribution tby being able to get rid of all these syncophants after the election.
Evan Owen - He can afford to say that...
11:15 | 03 Jul 2009
....he doesn't need it whereas many people will because they are worn out after paying for his employer's acts or ommissions. The naivety is staggering. was it him who said it would be wrong for insurers to change the terms on their annually renewable PPI? Those comments displayed a complete lack of understanding of how insurance works!
This man should keep his personal opinions to himself, he is now a regulator appointed by HM Treasury, his 'report' was commissioned by HM Treasury.... hmmm.. perhaps he is the voice of HM Treasury!!
Michael Dunn - But how many people work over 65
11:37 | 03 Jul 2009
I find all this talk of working to 70 quite amusing because I don't think there are the jobs available.
The process at the moment seems to be forced early retirement at about 60 then a shelf stacker at BQ (or similar) until retirement age. Having worked all your life and paid the highest tax in Europe* for that period does not seem to be a very good deal.
*To make the point I worked in Switzerland for a period and on return had to pay the difference in tax I would have paid in the UK. This was an additional 10% of my earnings having paid the full tax in Switzerland including all compulsory health tax’s etc.
A major problem seems any product that contains the word Pension or Saving the Government seem to think is fair game to raid.
Is the government going to be able to house, cloth and feed all the people who can’t continue to work and then go onto meaningless government pensions?
Philip Parkin
12:38 | 03 Jul 2009
Probably time to make Logan`s Run
a reality, won`t need to worry about a pension then.
swally - retirement age: Uh?
12:44 | 03 Jul 2009
While it may be true that agism in the workplace has diminished due to legislation and the demonisation of the practice that followed, it is still rife. There are millions who are still forced into early retirement, or who are simply worn out by years of heavy manual work.
Increasing the retirement age to 70 may make financial sense, but Turner totally ignores the practical difficulties.
John Whitehurst - Let me get mine first!
13:02 | 03 Jul 2009
Don't let him do it before I am in receipt of mine in 2026 at age 66!
TERRY - Lets stop the state pension.
13:23 | 03 Jul 2009
If we stopped the state the state pension we could make the public pensions even more generous.
Since the parasites that run this country don't need the state pension it will continue to be derisory.
David Beechey - Living in a dream world
14:13 | 03 Jul 2009
The politicians etc who make these pronouncements that people will have to work until they are 68 or 70 inhabit a peculiarly blnkered world. I am 67 and work 90% of my time in a family business. My work is not physical but I know my body and if I was a bricklayer, carpenter, drainlayer, scaffolder etc. not only would my output be low but would ( particularly in the case of a scaffolder or drainlayer ) be downright dangerous to myself and/or my co-workers.
typically it is people who never expect to have to work ,if they don't want to, beyond 55 who make these insensitive comments. If they ever talk to actual 'working class people' they might, just might, appreciate the realities of life.
Michael Hellman - Short Sighted
15:15 | 03 Jul 2009
Women to retire by 2020 at 65 I cant believe it why not now, talk about governments inaction.As long as I have been alive the population has been ageing. And most people are younger for longer, I do think state pensions should be paid at an equal amount to all regardless of N I contibutions and as the first commentator says from the age of 68. And if people want to retire earlier then there is nothing to stop them, but they will have to fund themselves, because the reality is the country cant afford the ageing population.
Orlando Furioso - Public sector pensions
23:00 | 03 Jul 2009
There always seems to be confusion about public sector wages and pensions, with those who tell us that the public sector worker accepts a lower salary for a higher pension.THAT JUST IS NOT TRUE.
The government's own Office of National Statistics states that the average private sector wage is around £24,000 per annum whilst the average for the public sector is close to £26,000, which is around £2,000 more. On top of this is their pension. If the benefits it provides had to be saved for, it would require contributions equal to 33% of salary throughout working life, or another nearly £9,000 per annum on average.
So the average public sector worker is getting benefit for his job of close to £35,000 per annum, whilst you poor s*ds are earning the average only of £24,000...
And their holidays are longer (6 weeks eventually); and they take more days off for 'sickness' overall.
You know, the british public (helped by the media) have just sorted out MP's and their crazy expenses claims. Perhaps the public need now to forcefully bring the sense of unfairness to our politicians. They are all relying on your vote next year. Tell them we expect them to work to put the public sector and private sector on a similar pension basis.
As an example, remember if the money spent each year on public sector pensions were instead shared with the retiring private sector pensioners, it would increase their state basic pensions by nearly 50% and give them each a tax free lump sum on retirement of nearly £8,000.
That's the scale of the present unfairness...
Cape Town - It's a trick
08:33 | 04 Jul 2009
There's a very real problem because the longer life expectancy (excluding hod carriers) has increased liabiliies while the financial crisis has reduced assets.
Increasing contributions can help, but not for a generation. In the present, what can you do? Reduce payouts, increase payins, reduce the length of liability.
Raising the pensionable age is a good idea on paper. But in reality, we'll need guys at the entrance to offices to remind workers where their desks are, rest rooms for afternoon naps, lowered expectations as to productivity ... is this going to solve the present competitivity gap or contribute to the West's decline?
Raising the pensionable age doesn't mean workers will work to 70 or 75. They'll resign through ill health or fatigue or be sacked. But if the worker hasn't paid in the full contributions (over say 47 years instead f 37), then he will be offered a part-pension and not a full pension.
This is maybe part of the manipulative solution.
John Sinclair - IF
10:35 | 04 Jul 2009
If the retirement is to be increased to seventy as suggested, then this should be right across the board, public and private sector, including the police, firefighters, trade union officials, judges etc. NO EXCPTIONS.