raising pension age

I did retire from full time work at 63. Should have been 64 but took a 10% cut in private pension ( it was tiny) as could not stand the stress any longer. I got my state pension a year later at 64, missed getting it at 60 by 3 months.

So at the moment I have state pension and 2 tiny private pensions and am still working part time at 66 because I can’t afford not to. I moved to the SE to be near my family and all my outgoings are much more expensive . Will have to stop working at some point, still love my job here but can’t work forever and really won’t have enough money to cover bills without my small salary. Don’t know what the answer is and I’ve worked since I was 16.

And yes would like to see the MP’s having to watch every penny they spend

My father was a headmaster.
He certainly didn't work your hours Even when he started teaching.
Does your contract mean you have to be in school at 7am and not leave before 7pm?
Doesn't the working time directive apply to teachers or did you opt out?

That was to GagaJo

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Curious as to why anyone would risk their health working 20/30 hours more than their contracted hours.

How long have you been out of the workplace, Gabriella? You seem very out of touch with the changes.

Workload and working time directive don't meet in the middle. Go into any school. Teachers will tell you the same thing.

Beyond this, I'm not debating with you GG54. As I said, real life work situations and you...

Life in your gilded cage is leaving you completely out of touch Gabriella. My closest friend is the SENCO at a local school. She begins her working day at 08.00 so that everything is ready for pupils to arrive. Her school day ends at 17.00 provided that she doesn't have a meeting with school governors, staff meetings, parents who "want a chat" about their child, staff training, multi disciplinary meetings or parents evening. When she gets home, she spends her evenings and weekends marking work, writing reports to support statemented children, preparing for the next lessons, writing to the local ED to seek additional funding for children who need extra support, writing reports and requests for additional support in cases where a child's safety or home situation is a risk to a child. Every aspect, of every day, has to be logged and reported ready for OFSTED inspections. Every child has to have an individual learning plan that demonstrates what level of attainment they are at, and expected to achieve. The demand for transparency in the classroom has massively increased the need for continual and continuous reporting. Who do you think does this Gabriella, and when?

If you took time out of being so self congratulatory for a while, you'd know that there is a whole world of hard working, dedicated workers out there who are buckling under the strain of keeping the wheels on the bus.

Do you know, Gabriella, every time you 'virtually' open your mouth you shove your foot further down it.

My mother was a Head Teacher. She didn't work 70 hours a week either, She retired 45 years ago. Teaching is a whole different ball game now. As you would know if you had any connection with reality.

It's hard to believe that you're a real person sometimes...

Can I put my hand up GG54 and ask a question, politely and out of curiosity what job you did when you were working that didn't cause you any stress and how long ago was you dad a Headmaster?

Teaching wasn't the way it is now even 15 years ago. Nearly time for me to stop, if ONLY I were able to retire!

What about the High Court judgement of the Backto60 group? Anyone heard further about it?

How nice to have swanned through life without a care in the world and have sufficient money to totally forget about applying for your state pension.

I would say that every job at times is not without its stresses and some are a lot more stressful than others.

I am not a teacher and have no grandchildren, but I am not so stupid that I am unaware how stressful that job is and the number of hours put in especially with the interminable number of meetings, preparation for the work next day and the marking of papers.

I would also think that today's children are more difficult to teach. I sat at my desk without a peep. I was educated in Scotland so it was a leather strap applied if one was out of line.

I am shocked at the lack of empathy voiced in some of the posts in this thread.
My hope is that now men will be affected adversely and as unjustly as women protests may increase.
The NI fund allegedly shouldn't be used for any other purpose but has been used to lower the National Debt, shocking, and I am delighted that this has now been made public.
It's super that some people feel they benefit from working on until in their 70's but I find it insulting when other women talk as if those of us who would like to retire when we expected to are either lazy or holding out our hands complete with begging bowl.
Please remember we, and our employers, have paid in to this expecting a return.

The Working Time Directive doesn't apply to teachers because it's an average over a certain number of weeks (I'd have to look up the exact number), so when holidays are factored in, teachers don't officially work over permitted hours. However, every teacher knows about Clause 19, which means that teachers have to work however long it takes to do the job. If they don't, they will be put on competency procedures.

GagaJo, you are a similar age to me. I am self-employed as a private music teacher and work/have worked in schools as well as from home. I realise l am very fortunate and may well reduce numbers in the next decade. However, as l am self-employed l have no full-back such as sick pay. There are hidden pressures involved too, such as entering pupils for exams, concerts etc. While l love what l do, one to one tuition is very intense and l find l become increasingly exhausted by the end of each term in a way that l did not even ten years ago. I was speaking with my mother earlier about this and the way that governments of every variety have wasted money that could have been used for our pensions. We came to the conclusion that the only real financial benefit we have ever had in our lifetimes has been the student grant. She also observed that they are probably hoping we will die off before we get our pensions. She, incidentally, has enjoyed her free TV licence for all of two years and that privilege is being removed too.

Numbers of pupils l mean.

Musicgirl I think we're in agreement that no teacher does the job for any reason other than the vocation. It's a slog, stressful, exhausting BUT ultimately, rewarding. I couldn't do 'just a job' because there's one thing that I find more soul destroying than hard work, and that's boredom.

Another reality for many women is, of course, the fact that in addition to our paid work many of us are still supporting our children and elderly parents.

GagaJo, I'm with you all the way there.

This is a thread about pensions, why does it turn into a debate about teachers?
I do a demanding job and so do many others who like me cannot retire until we are 66. I know their are alot of people on this site who are in the teaching profession but it is not all about you.
I am lucky I too have a final salary pension, but not enough to let me retire. I have to carry on. My position is not as bad as some who have to work unsocial hours in retail, catering, housekeeping or cleaning. Some of these people are in ill health due to the type of job they are doing, and some of these people do not have a work pension either.

The putting up the age of the state pension is a disgrace, and we are all affected some worse than others, and as someone said up thread a lot of people will die before they get a chance to enjoy their retirement. I also know a lot of people who are suffering worry, and depression about this as they are ill and don't know how long they can carry on working.

Get Gabriella to sort them out, raficha.

rafichagran, I'm not a teacher, my spelling was far to bad for that sort of job. I worked in admin (a secretary who couldn't spell) and as also for a trade union, which made my work day longer and also added weekend work as well at times.

Nobody in government has taken into account our caring responsibility. parents, children, gc etc. A decent social care policy would help ease the burden. I read somewhere that our life expectancy has dropped over the last few years, mostly in poor and deprived areas, so raising the pension age is certainly not going to help.

What on earth is going on?? This is totally crazy

My father is dead nowand would have been 102 this year so it was a good few years ago that he was head of a school.
I'm more up to date than most as 4 of my friends are teachers and one is head of a comprehensive.
I'm fully aware of the extras but you know that when you go into the system...surely.
My dad marked books at home but the workload expected nowadays far exceeds that of his day, however, I read nothing of teachers being excluded from the 2003/16 directive unless they (or anyone else) opt out.
Does no-one lodge an objection to working those hours?
Unions not interested?

I was a lawyer and certainly put in the hours when necessary but billed accordingly and the scenario is different as I had a shared clerk to do my diary.