Means testing state pension.

It was obvious before the election that when the new government came into power, they would have to grasp the nettle and pass some legislation that would be unpopular - it wasn't a coincidence that the previous one had avoided doing a thorough weeding.

I am sure most of us have started to tame a neglected garden. How long did it take? First you have to find out just what tangle of vegetation you are dealing with, then you have to decide what to save, what to eliminate, and what to prune back or train into a new shape. Only then can you plan new flowerbeds, order plants, plant seeds and bulbs and so on. Will it all be thriving and ready to enjoy after a few weeks?
How long do you have before the gardening season is over for the year and you must pause and gather strength for the next bout?

How can you politely tell your highly critical neighbours that when you bought the house you also bought a spade, a fork, a strimmer and a pruning knife, not a magic wand that transformed the garden overnight into an earthly Paradise?

There have been only a few weeks for the incoming government to survey the prospect before them (with different eyes and more accurate facts and figures) and to start making solid plans and taking preliminary action, before Parliament closed down for the recess. Also, remember, both parties have had a hectic time fighting an election, and the Labour party has had to choose and brief the team which will do the bulk of the horticultural work.

That action cannot take place immediately, because there have to be discussions and votes before any legal rules are altered - there may be changes at this stage. Then the practical arrangements have to be put in place.

As Monica says, it will be at least a year before any effect is visible of a different approach. There is no magic wand that will change anything overnight

Well said, M0nica. There has been so much speculation and blatant misrepresentation of what the government has done/will do. I hoped it would die down after the election, but it hasn't. I'm now hoping that it will die down when Parliament reopens and things start happening.

I am not a labour voter, never have been and probably never will be, but I do think all those, once pro Labour people now knocking Labour after only a few weeks in power should consider what the alternative is and why it is that at the last elelction it was thrown our and replaced by Labour.

I am not making any comments dissing this current government until it has been in power at least a year and we can see what they are actually doing and how it is working out in practice.

eazybee

^Its nasty and deliberate scaremongering for a vulnerable group and they should be ashamed, there is absolutely no evidence for it.^

I would say the so-called 'vulnerable group' is more alarmed by the doom-laden pronouncements Kier Starmer, a not very skilful demagogue, persists in making at present.

Or would you prefer a skilful demagogue, who knows which honeyed phases to tell the population as he fiddles while Rome the country burns goes even further down the drain that he has inherited?

Cossy

eazybee

Its nasty and deliberate scaremongering for a vulnerable group and they should be ashamed, there is absolutely no evidence for it.

I would say the so-called 'vulnerable group' is more alarmed by the doom-laden pronouncements Kier Starmer, a not very skilful demagogue, persists in making at present.

Would you rather Starmer lied and was a jolly, jokey buffoon or crashed our economy?? I know I wouldn’t!

There’s nothing jolly about the state of our Country and I’d rather hear honest bad news than happy lies!

Jolly, jokey buffoon, crashed the economy. Who on earth can you mean Cossy:? Surely not Johnson and Truss.
Some people must have very short memories.

There are a lot of rumours flying around, most of them of them fuelled by the right wing press and pundits.
Desperate times call for desperate measures but we don't know what all the measures will be yet.

PamelaJ1

Doodledog, he opted out of SERPS.

Ah, could you do that unilaterally? I thought it was just employers who did so on behalf of their staff. It's all so complicated, and has life-changing implications for so many people.

I think these days people are more clued up than we were - at one time people felt that they could trust 'the system' to do right by us. My children (early 30s) are far less confident about that than I was. I have always been in a Union, however, so was kept informed that way - something else that I would advise anyone still in work to do.

Well Cossy, if you believe that Labour is honest and truthful you probably need to take off those rose-tinted glasses!

The government are saying that the state pension is a benefit even though we paid into the system when we started working, me in 1958 aged 15 until I retired aged 60.

If I had paid into an insurance policy for all those years I would at 60 have received a lump sum of money.

So why are the government saying that something we paid money into for all those years is a benefit which they can manipulate to their own advantage as and when they want to. A benefit is something that is given freely and because I paid into the system I do not class my pension as a benefit but as a right.

eazybee

^Its nasty and deliberate scaremongering for a vulnerable group and they should be ashamed, there is absolutely no evidence for it.^

I would say the so-called 'vulnerable group' is more alarmed by the doom-laden pronouncements Kier Starmer, a not very skilful demagogue, persists in making at present.

Would you rather Starmer lied and was a jolly, jokey buffoon or crashed our economy?? I know I wouldn’t!

There’s nothing jolly about the state of our Country and I’d rather hear honest bad news than happy lies!

Grantanow

It is technically a benefit. Your NI contributions did not create a pension fund from which you draw the pension. NI contributions pay the pensions of those already retired. When you retire your pension is paid by the NI contributions of those still in work. So it's a benefit just like any other benefit but most of us feel we've paid in and therefore have a moral right to a payout.

Absolutely correct!

I’d love to see this changed, ringfenced and treated far more like a private pension!

Doodledog, he opted out of SERPS.

Calendargirl

I worked for a bank and received my bank pension at 60, nearly 3 years before I qualified for my state pension.

My bank pension reduced when I started to receive my SP, something called ‘clawback’.

Never really understood why, but obviously to do with how the bank ‘opted us out’ or something.

I knew it would happen, as I had been told by colleagues about it.

I think that is the Guaranteed Minimum Pension (GMP) I mentioned above.

I worked for a bank and received my bank pension at 60, nearly 3 years before I qualified for my state pension.

My bank pension reduced when I started to receive my SP, something called ‘clawback’.

Never really understood why, but obviously to do with how the bank ‘opted us out’ or something.

I knew it would happen, as I had been told by colleagues about it.

Its nasty and deliberate scaremongering for a vulnerable group and they should be ashamed, there is absolutely no evidence for it.

I would say the so-called 'vulnerable group' is more alarmed by the doom-laden pronouncements Kier Starmer, a not very skilful demagogue, persists in making at present.

“Labour have to do something as there's a £20billion black hole that they weren't expecting when they planned for after the election.”

We need to get this into perspective £ 20 billion is a lot of cash but is less than 5% of spending which is £550 billion, some extra has got to be found.

CGT charged at marginal tax rate (up to 45%) will raise most of that, other changes, private schools, expats, non doms etc will contribute more to fill the “Black Hole”

It’s very good practice to cut down on waste, there is no need to give benefits to those that don’t need them, spend the money of improving services.

Sorry, means testing State Pension

vampirequeen

It's scaremongering. Parts of the press have been doing it since the election. Labour are going to tax the poor. Labour are going to tax the middle class. 'You whoever 'you' are, are going to have to pay out another £2000/£5000 a year. There is no evidence produced. It's all just conjecture and trouble causing.

Labour have to do something as there's a £20billion black hole that they weren't expecting when they planned for after the election.

Tbh, and I know I won't be popular for saying this, but there are people who don't need the WFP. My mam, for one, who isn't rich but is what I'd class (and I know this is just my opinion) as well off. I asked her what she did with her WFP and she said she just left it in the bank because she could pay her bills. My problem with the change is that it's an abrupt cut off point. If you get pension credit then you get WFP but if you're outside of the cut off point by only £1 then you lose £300. I think there should have been a sliding scale with the amount decreasing as incomes increased. The scale could go up to the point where the pension credit recipients would be before cutting off completely. That way the poorest would be on an even footing.

I agree with all you’ve said! I do think Labour should have phased this out after this year though and it’s awful (for them) that’s it’s their first big move and off course it’s unpopular.

Having said that my parents didn’t need the WFP/WFA and received it for many many years, & I know far wealthier pensioners than they were receiving it too.

As I’ve stated before I just feel sorry for those not eligible for pension credits but still struggling who will be hit by this move.

As for “means testing” I think it’s a nonsense, the Telegraph every single day has “click bait” headlines about how the Labour Party are going to destroy us all.

We need to pull together and I despise this divisive behaviour!

Lovetopaint037

OldFrill

Please be aware "this money co.uk" is part of the Daily Mail group.
Certainly noting like Martin Lewis' money site.

That explains a lot. I expect the Telegraph will be trying to rattle empty cages.

The article states quite clearly that the government has no plans to means-test pensions.

I'm waiting for them to introduce a Euthanasia Bill.
That will sort out the pensions problem.

OldFrill

Please be aware "this money co.uk" is part of the Daily Mail group.
Certainly noting like Martin Lewis' money site.

That explains a lot. I expect the Telegraph will be trying to rattle empty cages.

Sorry - I missed your post CariadAgain. I agree with you 100%. I’d be happy if the government scrapped the credits to people who could work but don’t. How much would that save?

Doodledog

If he wasn’t opted out, his NI will all have gone to his State Pension so it should have gone up every year with the triple lock. I don’t know that opting out saved firms money (but I could very easily be wrong there). It was just a different way of allocating contributions - swapping from the pension part of NI to the fund in employees’ personal pensions.

It was probably better as the other part of that particular firm's pension had 0% increases many years!

But it was a very complicated system.

Yes, we KNOW it is something we have paid in for

We know we paid in for it even though it is paid out of current general taxation because those married women who were fooled into paying a Married Women's Stamp years ago do not receive a State Pension for those years because there were no contributions towards SP made during those years. We were lied to by employers and did not find out until later.

If you looked at a forecast on the Government Gateway website you could see just how many years you contributed towards your State Pension.

If he wasn’t opted out, his NI will all have gone to his State Pension so it should have gone up every year with the triple lock. I don’t know that opting out saved firms money (but I could very easily be wrong there). It was just a different way of allocating contributions - swapping from the pension part of NI to the fund in employees’ personal pensions.

AGAA4

I don't think state pension is a benefit. People pay in all their working lives so it wouldn't go down well if you were told you wouldn't be receiving anything.

Quite! They can keep telling us until they're blue in the face that it's a "benefit" and that what we've been paying for for ourselves personally has been given to someone in the generation before us - but it won't make a scrap of difference to the fact that we KNOW it is something we have paid in for specially and that the person that is getting funded by it is ourselves personally. I know I'll be livid if they start reaching out grabby hands for MY money I MYSELF paid in for and all the more so because I worked full-time for all the necessary number of years to qualify for that pension (ie none of it was "credited" to me - I literally "bought and paid for" every bit of it myself). Not to mention the little question of how would they plan to "square that circle" of the amount we get is dependant on how many years we ourselves have put into the pot (whether paid in for or credited in for). If we'd not had a job ever during that time or been credited for that time then there would be no State Pension there for us personally. So obviously - the pension we have paid for is our own.

Calculation of the old SP could be very complicated.
DH has a very small works pension, part of it has GMP applied, part does not. In about 15 years, it has hardly gone up at all, presumably because he was not opted out and that saved his firm money at the time?