- Conference
- 2016 National Delegate Conference
- Date
- 2 February 2016
- Decision
- Carried
Elderly and retired people deserve to have a decent state pension.
Conference asserts that the state pension is not a benefit but is ours by right.
Conference believes that older people are being hit particularly hard by current austerity measures.
The basic State Retirement Pension which for many from April, 2016 will be £119.30 (for a single person) is well below the poverty line and is hardly an adequate amount to live on, even in the most modest of households. The TUC assesses that pensioners need an amount that is higher still than this.
Even the Daily Telegraph has reported Britain as being one of the worst places in Europe for State Pension, countries like Austria, Finland and Belgium were rated above average, while maintaining relatively strong public finances. We are told we are recovering as a country financially, yet we live with this shame that our pensioners live well below the poverty line.
We have contributed and continue to contribute to a system which is grossly unfair. Britain is also reported to be at the bottom of the world league tables.
With an ageing population there can be no excuse for paying one of the worst pensions in Europe, despite Britain being the fifth wealthiest country in the world.
31,000 pensioners died of hypothermia in 2012/13 (Daily Telegraph 16 November 2013) despite the winter fuel allowance. The number was double that of five years previously.
The current system lets women down because care responsibilities have affected patterns of work and contributions towards pension.
Taking into account the cost of housing, fuel bills, food costs and health conditions, many older people are struggling to survive and to have the dignity and security they deserve in retirement.
We need a decent state retirement pension that enables us to live rather than exist and is fair to all.
Conference calls upon the National Executive Council to continue to highlight this issue as a priority.
Conference therefore calls on the National Executive Council to liaise with UNISON’s Retired Members’ Organisation, the National Pensioners Convention and other appropriate bodies and groups to campaign involving all levels of the membership to achieve a Living Pension which calls for:
1)A weekly State Retirement Pension which allows every pensioner to pay for necessities and enjoy social and leisure activity; with a top up for pensioners who receive no other income who would otherwise fall below the poverty line;
2)A State Retirement Pension equal to the full new state pension of £155.65 per week (rate at April 2016) for all pensioners so that no one has to claim pension credit;
3)Pension equality available to all age qualified citizens; by reducing the new 35 year qualifying period;
4)Pension increases every year measured by average earnings increase, Retail Price Index, Consumer Prices Index or 2.5%, whichever is highest;
5)Defence of the current triple lock from increasing attack;
6)Consideration to be given to replacing the RPI and CPI by an index that more accurately reflects the increase in costs for pensioners and for this to be applied to work place pensions as well as the State pension;
7)The National Insurance Fund to be ring fenced;
8)Intergenerational unfairness to be addressed by improving the pension prospects of the younger generations and oppose attempts to dumb down the rights of pensioners;
9)Dignity and security in retirement.
