"Women need a higher basic state pension – not window dressing"

24/10/2008

Britain’s biggest pensioner organisation, the National Pensioners Convention (NPC) has described today’s announcement by the government to allow pensioners to buy back up to six years of missing national insurance contributions, as “window dressing”.
 
Dot Gibson, NPC vice president said: “Up to five million existing women pensioners fail to get a full state pension because they spent years raising children, caring for relatives or working part-time. Many of these women are now living below the poverty line and will simply be unable to afford to buy back any extra years of pension.

 

"Up to a million older women may not even be alive by 2010 when the government intends to make the change and an extra year’s pension will only provide £2.35 a week more on the state pension.
 
“But the real indictment is that even a full state pension is only £90.70 a week – more than £60 below the official poverty level and amongst the lowest in Europe. Women’s pensions are a national disgrace and no amount of window dressing will mask the fact that the basic state pension must be raised across the board for all pensioners to help them avoid poverty in retirement.”
 
Women’s Pension Facts

 

• Women’s pensions are a ‘national disgrace’ as admitted by the government

 

• The Pensions Act 2007 will help more working age women to obtain a full basic pension by allowing a full pension after 30 years of contributions or care credits for those reaching state pension age after April 2010

 

• But older women have experienced far greater disadvantages in employment and pay than women do nowadays

 

• They were badly advised by DSS about the ‘small stamp’; misinformed by DSS about the amount of SERPS payable to widows; and could not know that state pensions would be savagely cut from 1980 onwards

 

• Most receive only a partial basic pension, much less than £87 per week, because they lack the 39 years of contributions/credits

 

• Most older women have no private pension income

 

• Their total personal income is only 57% of men’s on average; they lost out through caring for their families

 

• Hence the poorest pensioners, those eligible for means tested Pension Credit, are mainly women
 
The NPC is calling for the government to:
• Increase the basic pension to the official poverty level of £151 a week

 

• Link the basic pension to earnings or prices (whichever is the higher)

 

• Pay the state pension on a universal basis to all pensioners