Second report of the Pension Commision

Milarky

Due out on 30th November - giving the politicians the chance to ignore it until the new year - or quietly forget about it altogether.

Maybe I'm being cynical, but the convenience of timing, the hasty elevation to the peerage of chairman, Adair Turner [a 'peoples peer' no less] before a final conclusion of his work on this, the swiftness with which the government cancelled council tax revaluation in England for at least four years, the use of a discredited politician [DB] placed in a key ministry [work and pensions] with talk of '8 principles' where following just one - being straight - would be much better, the tax credits fiasco [£1bn all but written off], a wholly parsimonious approach taken to the compensation of failed schemes [the FAS] and the ''you're on your own'' design of the so-called 'protection fund' with clear blue water between state and the private pension sector deficits all indicate very little willingness to 'muck in' on this one. Probably, they'll say something like:

''We must try harder to get people to save but it's above our pay grade to push the current rickety system any further by suggesting compulsion at this stage. Give it another 10 years and have we'll have another look at it."

Anyone a bit more hopeful out there?

EdInvestor

The Govt has already said it won't respond to Turner until the Spring,IIRC. I predict they will signal the intention to put the retirement age up to 67 some time in the future and then we can all go back to sleep.

There are rumours that SERPS/S2P could be abolished in favour of a higher basic state pension, but that sounds a bit too simple for Gordon Brown.

The A-day measures are pretty radical of course. It might make more sense to delay tinkering with the state pension system until after their full effect is seen in two or three years' time.

The pension industry and companies are already under quite a lot of strain sorting out the new rules - and the wind-down of With profits is probably not a simple matter either. Could it cope with a big change in say, contracting out at the same time?

The other problem is that from the general economic point of view, a rise in pension saving is not required at present as it would impact economic growth.