10 August 2009
David Norgrove, Chairman of the Pensions Regulator, has warned
in an interview with the BBC that the state pension age may need to
rise to age 70.
Currently, the state pension age is 60 for women and 65 for men.
In the Pensions Act of 2007 new legislation detailed a rise in
pension age, for both men and women, to 68 by 2044.
His comments echo those of Lord Turner, Chairman of the FSA, who
also said the same in an interview with the BBC in July.
David Norgrove said rising life expectancy meant many people
would have to wait longer in future to draw a state pension. He
added: "The government's recent legislation is increasing the state
retirement age progressively to 68. I think it will end up higher
than that. People are going to have to work longer, partly because
we're not going, as a nation, to save as much for retirement as we
did in the past."
Pensions Minister Angela Eagle said there were no plans to raise
the pension age any higher than 68. She told the BBC: "We believe
that we've covered the predictions of increased life expectancy
adequately in the legislation and unless these statistics change
we'll have periodic reviews, but it won't happen for another
generation.
Patrick South from the charity Age Concern and Help the Aged
said "I think it's important that people can predict accurately
when the retirement age is if we're trying to persuade them to save
into pensions, and that's what we're trying to do. So there is
certainty there. Any increase in the state pension age would affect
the poorest people disproportionately. Far better to focus on the
barriers that currently prevent people working past 65, and chief
among those is the default retirement age which enables employers
to compulsorily retire people when they reach the age of sixty
five."
The full article and the interview can be found on the BBC
webpage here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8191011.stm
