You don't need to be in receipt of a pension to sign, you just need to agree with the petition, so anyone who is likely to be affected by the freeze now or in the future, it's in your interest to add your name.

regards

Dizzy

I am sorry to pour cold water over this attempt ,but there was one a few months ago which the Government kicked out saying that it could not afford to increase these pensions. Why, I cannot understand as we have all paid in our taxes to the UK Government whilst we were working for these pensions.And if we all lived in the Uk THEY WOULD HAVE TO PAY THE INCREASES.I THINK THAT THE ONLY WAY FOR THIS TO SUCCEED IS TO TAKE IT TO THE EUROPEAN COURTS (POSSIBLY UNDER THE HUMAN RIGHTS ACT) , as the UK Governmt is discriminating against these pensioners .it would be interesting to hear the legal possibilites for this Trianman

Done.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Is the reason for the freezing in Oz due to the fact that after 10 years residency your entitled to a pension of some sort from the Oz goverment?

There have been several goes by various groups over the years. The last one was the "Carson" case, a test case over a lady living in South Africa. It was rejected by the Law Lords but with one dissenting voice: that lord in effect said it was a disgrace.

I believe the case is now up before the EU Human Rights court.

The governments have ver the years come up with all sorts of specious arguments -and as each was shown to be ridiculous they have changed to another.

"Too expensive" (That's ludicrous: on that argument any insurance company could renege on claims. The cost would be £400m - no-one is claiming back increases - and the cost of fraudulent social security claims is in the billions. The January report on the pension "fund" reported a surplus of £7.9Bn, by the way....)

"Never intended to enhance the standard of living of those who choose to live abroad" (Please show me where in the original legislation it says you have to live in the UK in retirement. And how, exactly, does a pension of £10 per week "enhance" a standard of living? Some long-time pensioners are *on* that and less)

"Depends on reciprocal agreements with other government". (Exactly why? In any case, the UK was the one who pulled out of the Australian accord.)

I could go on - the "arguments" put forward are frankly pathetic.

AND you don't have to be affected in order to sign this petition - you only have to understand the inequity of the situation.

Nothing to do with visa types at all. For some reason the UK government has decided to freeze pensions being paid to it's nationals residing in certain countries. Tell me why You would receive a full pension in the USA but a frozen one in Canada?

Every year there is any automatic notation not to uprate (unfreeze) certain pensions and it is suprising how many MP's know nothing about this to say no.

Yes the government rejected the last petition but we have to keep at it and keep making people aware of frozen pensions.

Many thanks to everyone who has signed and keep passing on the message.

I've signed the petition and passed on the details to friends and family asking them to sign also.
A lot more signatures are needed.

In fact, the opposite is the case.

I would ordinarily be sympathetic but the reality is that the U.K. is being generous in not means testing the entire pension, as Australia does ...

I really don't see how you can compare the two.

Pension provision is one of those few things that, like life insurance, relies on a long-term "contract" between a provider and the client.

I'm, not too well up on the history of the Australian pension, but if the means test was introduced after the tax was taken from the taxpayer IMO this is a breach of "trust". If you can call anything to do with politicians "trustworthy"!

In any case, you are extending the scope of the debate in bringing in means testing. Th point was that, after paying identical taxes and SS deductions for the same number of years, a pension paid to one individual is completely different to another's depending only on his domicile.

The UK isn't being generous in not means testing the pension,it is a contributory pension,you pay in to get money out when you retire.The same as the 9% SGC,money is paid in to be drawm out on retirement.There are no social security taxes in OZ to provide a pension.



Some dickhead decided years ago that the contributory pension would be scrapped in OZ,there would always be enough tax revenue to meet needs.The money that had been collected was put into general revenue.I think the means testing was brought in under Keating when a lot of pension reform went on and he decided super was the way to go.The first 3% was a wage increase given up by employees,it was supposed to rise to 15% over the years but J Howodd knocked that on the head.

The means testing is shocking,when you have a contributory scheme as in the US or UK then you have an incentive to save for retirement,your income is always X plus so you can lead a decent retirement.The OZ way is your income will always be X minus,they try to keep you in poverty.When there are no contributions going in it has to be means tested.

Reading a US senate paper on forthcoming social security problems there ,there was a suggestion of a means tested pension ,it was quickly thrown out as a disincentive to provide for yourself.However the vested interest view must be taken into consideration,no doubt there was vast lobbying from the financial industry as they saw their commissions reduced by the same attitude that prevails in OZ "why should I try to get ahead if they take pension off me"

There is no fundamental difference between income tax and "social security contribution."

Below is the response I got from 10 Downing Street to the last petition.
Basically it ignores the fundamental question of why isn't there equality and says "tuff luck pal".

I will be signing the new petition.


Unfreezepensions - epetition reply

3 January 2008
We received a petition asking:Government's response

Thank you for your e-petition about the annual uprating of State Pensions payable to British pensioners residing abroad.
As the petition correctly points out, State Pensions are paid out of the National Insurance Fund (NIF) rather than general taxation. The petition argues that the Government should use the current surplus in the Fund to meet the cost of uprating the State Pensions of all recipients living overseas.
The NIF is maintained under the control and management of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs. It is run on a "pay-as-you-go" basis; current income, mainly from national insurance contributions, pays for current expenditure mostly on Contributory Benefits. There is a requirement for the NIF to have sufficient funds, together with a working balance, to meet benefits expenditure. The uses to which the NIF can be put are clearly specified in legislation, with the majority spent on state pensions.
National insurance contributions and the associated social security benefits operate within the Government's fiscal rules designed to ensure sound public finances. When there is a surplus it is invested. Without this the Government would need to raise the equivalent through other means to fund public services. The NIF surplus is not therefore an extra resource available to spend.
To fund annual pension increases for all recipients in countries where upratings are not currently payable, we would have to raise additional income from UK taxpayers. Our priority, given the limited resources available, is to ensure that pensioners resident in the UK continue to see an increase in their living standards commensurate with the growth of the economy as a whole.

Have added our signatues hope it helps!

Have added mine too!

I was paying into a public/government pension in the UK and its looking like I may have to give up the ghost on transferring it as I was told by my employer that the inland revenue was particular about to which pension companies in oz that they would transfer to. I was only paying in for 4 and a half years but still - its my money, I earned it as a tax paying British resident.

The interesting thing is that each year the indexing provisions have to pass parliament - and they apply to *all* British pensioners. Then the government introduces another bit of add-on legislation which applies only to certain expats and which disallows the indexing to them. Very few MPs actually vote or even see this, hance the ignorance of the state of affairs. The procedure come around every year!