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@ James Purnell
Head of the Open Left project

I have been told that your party has no intention of indexing the state pensions of half the British pensioners who live abroad.  Is this correct?  The fund into which they paid is growing and there IS... Show more »I have been told that your party has no intention of indexing the state pensions of half the British pensioners who live abroad.  Is this correct?  The fund into which they paid is growing and there IS enough money to give parity to this small minority of British senior citizens, who retired abroad.  Why are they not given parity with the other half of British pensioners who also live abroad and who do receive their indexing? Show less »

Submitted by: dianelvin | 19 votes for this..

3 comments | Topic: Politics | Bookmark and Share

Answered by James Purnell

We do indeed increase the level of State Pension paid to UK citizens in the European Economic Area and Switzerland; or countries where we have  reciprocal social security agreements which allow for increases... Show more »We do indeed increase the level of State Pension paid to UK citizens in the European Economic Area and Switzerland; or countries where we have  reciprocal social security agreements which allow for increases to be paid there. Everywhere else the pension is frozen. The reason for this is simple. The costs of uprating everywhere would be £470m each and every year – a figure that would rise annually. The Government’s priority is to help the least well off pensioners living in this country and it will continue to help them so that the pensioners of Halifax are able to have a decent income in retirement. Show less »

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Comments

dianelvin at Jul 16 2010 12:00:00 AM : 

As I said in my question, there IS a sufficient surplus left over in the National Insurance fund each and every year after all the payments have been made.   At the last Freedom of Information request we found that this stood at over 60 billion pounds.  This is 120 times the amount needed to index the remaining 50% of pensioners, each and every year,  who do not now receive indexing.  This money is not being used for the purpose it was collected for.  This, in my opinion, is tantamount to dishonesty on the part of the government, which, in the past, has used this money as a general tax, not as insurance specifically collected in a Fund for pensioners, health etc. 

There is no need to make these agreements with different countries. They do not "allow" for increases, They give the government an excuse not to pay the indexing to 50% of pensioners abroad.   It is an irrelevant spurious excuse. All that is needed is for each and every pensioner (not just those in Halifax) to be paid the indexed pension he or she insured for.  The money is there for this AND for the poor of the country.  There WAS an agreement with Australia but the British Government still refused to pay its pensioners who lived in Australia their upgrading.  In the end Australia withdrew the agreement in disgust! 

Peter Morris at Jul 17 2010 12:00:00 AM : 

I think James Purnell has forgotten that he is no longer the Pensions Minister so there is no requirement to keep trotting out the same old arguments that the Work and Pensions Mandarins versed him in.  He should be thinking more in terms of fairness, equity and equality.  Why are 500,000 pensioners around the world paid state pensions that are uprated each year just as if they were living in the UK, whilst another 500,000 pensioners living in mainly Commonwealth countries have their pensions frozen?  Purnell has explained the mechanics of this illogical system and it is about time someone recognised this discrimination for what it is and worked to fix the system.  If it would cost £470 million to uprate all the frozen pensioners then it must be costing about that same amount to keep uprating the other half a million pensioners.  Why are some pensioners more equal than others?
dianelvin at Jul 17 2010 12:00:00 AM : 

James Purnell, I have had my say but have been asked to make a comment on behalf of a pensioner in Australia, who at present is unable to log into the website for some reason.  She noted your statement  "The Government’s priority is to help the least well off pensioners living in this country and it will continue to help them so that the pensioners of Halifax are able to have a decent income in retirement."  Her question is:" Would the pensioners of Halifax continue to have a decent income in retirement if, for personal reasons, they had to emigrate to be with relatives in Australia?"

 

 

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