- Conference
- 2004 National Women's Conference
- Date
- 15 October 2003
- Decision
- Carried as Amended
Conference is concerned that women today are facing a considerable pensions gap: for every pound of income received by men in a pensioner couple, women receive less than 32 pence. Female single pensioners are one of the poorest groups of the older population, and currently nearly a quarter live in poverty.
The issue of pension provision is of major concern for both women and men, but too often pensions have been designed without taking into account the differences between women’s and men’s lives. The system assumed that women would be able to rely on their husband’s pensions to support them in old age.
The current state pension has failed to maintain a reasonable level since the Conservative government broke the link with earnings. This impacts disproportionately on women’s pensions who were traditionally excluded from occupational pensions and had lower earnings during their lifetime even if in a scheme.
The Fawcett Society and Age Concern have joined forces to run a campaign on women and pensions Let’s Make Pensions Work: A Fair Deal For Women. The campaign aims to make women and pensions a higher policy priority for government and the wider public policy networks, and to promote policy solutions to the current problems.
Conference shares the view that the levels of hardship currently experienced by older women in the United Kingdom are intolerable and, unless the Government acts now, many younger women will face an old age in poverty just as their mothers and grandmothers did. The key to pension reform is to use the more variable patterns of employment which women experience as the premise of any new system.
However, as these reforms will certainly not come into being overnight it is imperative that women today are in receipt of resources to enable them to make informed decisions on the best suitable pension provision.
Conference instructs the National Women’s Committee to:
1)produce an up-to-date booklet to explain the range and type of pensions currently available, and to highlight issues of particular relevance to women at different ages;
2)consider affiliation to the joint Age Concern/Fawcett Society campaign Let’s Make Pensions Work: A Fair Deal For Women;
3)write to the Pensions Minister, and to encourage women members likewise, to express dissatisfaction with current pension provision and to suggest reforms which will benefit women, including the restoration of the earanings link to the state pension.