The poorest are paying the highest price

A campaign demanding the basic state pension is raised above the official poverty level of £178 a week has been launched by Britain’s biggest pensioner pressure group. The national pensioner’s convention is also calling for a national care service paid for through general taxation as well as a winter fuel allowance of £500 per pensioner household.

Rights in retirement organisers hope the “rights in retirement” campaign will address some of the financial pressures that now face the country’s older population.

They claim:

• Britain’s state pension remains amongst the least adequate in Europe and sixth from bottom out of the world’s 46 most developed countries. Means-testing continues to be ineffective at getting help to those who need it most, and around 2.5m older people currently live below the official poverty line, with millions more struggling to meet the rising costs of living. 

• Social care at home or in a nursing home remains one of the few areas of the welfare state where individuals are largely left to fund the costs themselves. Recently, they say, there have been very serious issues raised surrounding the quality of care and the effectiveness of the regulator (the care Quality commission) in protecting some of the country’s most vulnerable older people. The care system will only be improved when it is professionalised – with proper pay, training and qualifications for the staff and a commitment to provide good quality services. 

• In the winter of 2010, 25,400older people died of cold related illnesses. Fuel poverty amongst the over 60s is now estimated to affect around 4.8m people. Energy bills are rising and the government has decided to cut the winter fuel allowance and the Warm Homes programme.

Dot Gibson, npc general secretary said: “most commentators now believe that the poorest in our society are beginning to pay the highest price for the cuts to public spending, benefits and services. 

Whether through lower pensions, reduced or inferior care services or cuts to winter fuel payments, older people are being told to shoulder a much bigger burden than those at the very top.

£40 billion in taxes “rather than declaring that the older generation is a drain on our society, we should recognise that every year, pensioners are providing 
over £40bn in taxes, unpaid caring, voluntary work and child minding. Yet around one in four pensioners still lives in poverty and rising costs of food and fuel, combined with record lows in savings returns, mean that pensioners continue to suffer a disproportionate increase in the cost of living.

“After a lifetime of working, older people deserve a decent state pension, proper care when they need it and the right to keep warm in the winter. The coalition government needs to do more to reassure pensioners that their retirement is not under threat.