- Conference
- Date
- June 16, 2017
- Decision
Conference notes that many older people are living well below the poverty level, which at present is £182 per week.
The UK State Pension is rated as one of the worst in Europe.
Pensions are not benefits but are in fact deferred wages from previous National Insurance payments and deductions from work and taxable income.
Older people and those with disabilities have been greatly affected by austerity. Increases in the cost of living, low interest rates and a loss of facilities through cuts, have hit them hard. Research from TUC has revealed that pensioners’ families will suffer cuts of £6-38 billion under the government’s welfare reform.
It is crucial that older people continue to receive their universal benefits. Means testing is neither effective or efficient. Elderly people do not want the indignity and humiliation of having to prove their entitlement to assistance, consequently each year benefits to the equivalent of £3 billion go unclaimed.
The government is spending less by increasing the state pension age. They claim we are all living much longer but, The International Longevity Institute UK found that in 2013 there were 30,000 fewer people in their nineties than previously projected and latest official figures show that life expectancy has now started to fall.
Now is the time to accept that there is an urgent need to substantially strengthen and reform a pension scheme that is over 100 years old and no longer fit for the purpose.
Conference calls on the National Executive Council to campaign for:
- A weekly state pension that allows every pensioner without any other income, to not only exist and pay for the essentials but, which gives them the ability to lead an active life;
- A single tier pension, which is the basic amount for every pensioner linked to average male earnings;
- Equally available to all age qualified citizens irrespective of gender, so that no one is obliged to claim pension credit.
National Retired Members’ Committee
57.1
Add new seventh paragraph:
“Conference notes the recent government review of the state pension by John Cridland and is determined to oppose any proposal that further raises the state pension age or reduces the value of the state pension.”
Delete point 2) and replace with:
“2) A single tier pension for every pensioner increased in line with the triple lock that is the better of average earnings, prices or 2.5%, and to continue to seek changes to the index used for calculating prices to include housing costs;”
National Executive Council