Whilst I am not yet approaching the time when I can claim my state pension, something that has already been delayed for many of us as George Osborne stole our entitlement by putting back the date from which we can claim it, I have half an eye on mine. David Cameron, in attempting to buy the votes of older people, introduced a so called “triple lock” on the state pension meaning that it would increase annually by either the rate of inflation, the rate of earnings or 2.5%, whichever is the greater. Given that the vast majority of senior citizens voted Conservative, it seems it worked. Now a kite has been flown by an outgoing minister, Baroness Altmann, who said the triple lock should be scrapped from 2020. It had “outlived its purpose”. Hmm.
What, pray, was the purpose of the triple lock in the first place? Putting aside the obvious answer – politics and buying votes – it was a way of ensuring pensioners had a reasonable standard of living and it was one I support. Yes, I know that pensioner benefits cost the state (us) some £90 billion a year but that’s not an issue for me. If we don’t look after older people who have paid into the system all their working lives, what kind of society do we want to live in? That’s why we should be wary of Altmann’s kite-flying.
When Altmann was pensions minister, she is reported to have lobbied Cameron to drop the 2.5% bit of the triple lock, but it was blocked on ‘political grounds”. Now that Cameron has gone, Altmann believes the abandonment of the policy is possible now Theresa May is in Downing Street. And I believe her.
Hands up if you believe the state pension is already highly generous and guarantees a lavish lifestyle for seniors? Of course it isn’t and doesn’t. From my own experience, gained throughout my working life, some pensioners are doing very nicely thank you, but many others are not. Pensioner poverty is still out there and it remains a blight on our society.
Changes would not bother Altmann herself who is a very rich woman, having enjoyed a lucrative career at Chase Manhattan, running the Bank’s international equity department in London, and holding directorships at Rothschild International Asset Management and NatWest. Losing that 2.5% element would not, I suggest, see her heading for her local food bank any time soon. But Altmann, who was actually appointed by a Labour government, is putting down a marker. This is how policy changes are made.
Scrapping the 2.5% part of the triple lock would, in low inflationary times, stop pensioners becoming slightly better off and a double lock would merely exist to stop them being worse off, standing still. Knowing what I know, I want pensioners to become better off, not remaining poor or slightly poor. They deserve more than that.
I cannot prove this, but consider the possibility that someone within the government suggested to Altmann to float the subject at a time when people might not notice? A weekend in the school holidays when parliament is in recess, when people are politicked out following a traumatic and divisive referendum, at a time when Jeremy Corbyn and the hard left are tearing the opposition party to pieces; just put the idea out there. The Sun probably won’t bother to report it, the Mail will find something about those pesky immigrants.
The government’s response has been priceless. It has “no plans” to change the triple-lock which is not the same thing as saying they will not get rid of it. And they have Cameron’s threat from before the referendum that suggested the triple lock might have to go if we left the EU. I can just imagine a scenario where May could shelve it quickly and efficiently, blaming everything that went before and the financial crisis that may envelope the country within the next few years. It will be someone else’s fault but don’t worry: we’ll bring in something else which we will say is just as good, but isn’t. Cynical? You bet.
The most likely scenario is that May concludes a deal with the EU and goes to the country for a general election which, if Corbyn is still Labour’s leader, swanning round the country, talking to large rallies of people who already agree with him, sees the Tories returned with a landslide majority, free to do whatever they like. You can bet the triple lock would be broken within days.
No, this is not an accident, this is not a coincidence. This is a Tory government and this is what Tory governments do. In truth, flying kites is what all governments do. And scrapping the triple lock would mean that many pensioners would never get any better off. Is that what we really want?
