New plan to push state pension age to 71 must be stopped as ‘only one in 10 will make it’ | Personal Finance | Finance [Video]

The government needs to rethink plans to push the state pension age higher and higher. People simply will not be well enough to carry on into their 70s and many will not make it.

Ros Altmann, a former Pensions Minister turned campaigner, has blasted the relentless drive to a higher retirement age, saying it will only plunge more older people into poverty.

The International Longevity Centre (ILC) recently said the UK state pension age must 71, but Altmann said while state pension costs must be kept under control, this is the wrong way to do it.

She said the rise in the state pension age to today’s 66 has already caused increased poverty among 65 year-olds, with one in four on the breadline.

Hiking the state pension age hits the poorest hardest, as they often have both worse health and little in the way of private pensions to fall back on.

Too many people are falling ill at earlier ages, due to poor diet, stress, bad housing, …