September 8: Breaking silence over injustice of inadequate pensions

ONCE more The Yorkshire Post has drawn attention to the state pension. Throughout the years, you have reported numerous surveys from the commercial and charitable sectors drawing attention to this common conclusion: the current state administered pension is inadequate now and for the future.

The appointment of your occasional columnist Baroness Ros Altmann as Minister of Pensions is a refreshingly new and laudable appointment – someone knowledgeable and experienced in the sector they are expected to influence and administer compared with the usual political practice of appointing a trainee learning on the job.

How she will fare in the tangled world of the body politic remains to be seen. So far it looks encouraging. You quoted her (The Yorkshire Post, July 25) as stating: “Older people ... contributed to our society and economy ... deserve to be looked after in their retirement.”

The Yorkshire Post also quoted Caroline Abraham of Age UK: “Worryingly the poorest pensioners are losing ground the fastest, leading to a widening gap between the have-nots among those in retirement.”

Tacitly, Westminster recognises the inadequacy to provide a survivable pension, implementing it with the “top up” pension credit for millions of pensioners plus winter allowance and TV licence.

The 2.5 per cent triple lock offered by the Conservatives in the last election appeared to be the only offer in the last election to the state pension – possibly it contributed to their victory.

However it amounts to just a £2.87 per week increase (£150 per annum) or 7.5p per hour and at the end of five years £15 per week, the equivalent of a 40p per hour increase to the state pension. Scarcely the sum to provide the adjustment necessary for justice!

Strangely those public minders of the nation’s social consciousness – the liberal left, the socialist conscience, the Archbishop of York, so prolific and profound in their condemnation of the Minimum Wage – appear to condone by omission the deplorable 
financial situation of the state pensioner.

Hopefully The Yorkshire Post will continue reporting the issue and Baroness Altmann will make a difference and address the concerns of Caroline Abrahams.

It is disconcerting, however, that they have the appearance of voices in the desert of indifference.