Iain Duncan Smith rethinks rise in pensions age

New retirement age plan benefits people born from 6 January-5 September 1954, at cost to taxpayers of £1.1bn The work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, has announced that the planned rise in the state pension age to 66 will be delayed until October 2020 in a move the government claims will benefit thousands of women. The original plans in the pensions bill meant women faced an increase in their state pension age to 65 from November 2018, followed by a further one-year increase to 66 from April 2020. That would have resulted in 33,000 women waiting an extra two years before they could claim the state pension. The new timetable will cap the increased wait to a maximum of 18 months, costing taxpayers £1.1bn. Campaigners had bombarded ministers, MPs and the media with letters demanding the rise in pension ages should be slowed down. They argued that women hit by the biggest increases in retirement age, most of whom are now aged 57, need more time to plan their finances or ensure they have work to cover any shortfall in retirement income caused by the later pension payments. Duncan Smith said: “We have listened to the concerns of those women most affected by the proposed rise in state pension age to 66 and so we will cap the increase to a maximum of 18 months. We have always made clear that we would manage any change fairly and ensure any transition is as smooth as possible.” However, only men and women born between 6 January and 5 September 1954 will benefit from the six-month delay. Lynda Hudson, a crown court employee in Birmingham who was born in December 1953, said: “I will still have to wait 18 months for my pension. What the politicians don’t appreciate is that it was very different for those of us born in the 50s: we didn’t have the same opportunity to go to university or help with childcare enabling us to work and build up our own pensions. It makes us feel that they don’t value anything that we’ve done. We’re just a burden.” The government said it had brought forward the increase in state pension age to 66 because of dramatic increases in life expectancy and the need to ensure no unfair burden was placed on the next generation. It said it would spend £45bn extra on pensioners by 2025 because of the triple guarantee to uprate the basic state pension by 2.5% or, if higher, the rate of increase in either earnings or prices. Chris Ball, chief executive of the Age and Employment Network, said: “The soundness of raising the state pension age and forcing people to go on working when the number of jobs available is shrinking will be rightly questioned.” He said asking people in physically demanding jobs to wait for their pension without making adequate provision to allow them to change roles and ease down in later life was “harsh at best”. Retirement age State pensions Iain Duncan Smith Pensions Retirement planning Work & careers Family finances Employee benefits Economic policy Jill Insley guardian.co.uk

Posted by on October 13, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.