winter fuel payment
#241
Re: winter fuel payment
I don't begrudge the elderly getting a pension, what I am saying is the youngsters will be having to wait/work for longer before they get one, leave education with £40k plus of debt plus most will find it much harder to save a deposit to buy a house let alone borrow the money to buy one.....what will £140 be worth when they retire?...maybe they should do away with pensions, then we all would have to provide for our own old age.
It is a really difficult conundrum for everyone that have quite a few years until they receive their pension. The problem with people providing their own pensions is how would they do it. The private sector has proved time and time again that they cannot be trusted to come forth with the money and even if they do what type of tinkering will future governments do. For every politician that says it will be ringfenced there is another who will change it.
Someone I know was going to buy a second house to use as a pension, great while prices rise but of what use would it be today presuming he could even sell the second house.
Anyone who thinks that they can pay for a pension using shares lives in cloud cuckoo land and has been proved to be useless over the years unless you are very lucky.
The next problem is the low and very low paid workers, how do they pay for a pension. They do some of the most important jobs for any society so do we just throw them out onto the street.
Unlike MT I would hate to see us back in the Victorian era.
Graham
#242
Banned
Joined: Dec 2006
Location: Living in a good place
Posts: 8,824
Re: winter fuel payment
I wish I had a second house to sell around here, they sell within 3 or 4 weeks and always go for more than the asking price...would be a nice little pension pot.
#243
Re: winter fuel payment
If only it were Greek banks and institutions that were exposed to the Greek bonds...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datab...s-bank-exposed
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datab...s-bank-exposed
#244
BE Enthusiast
Joined: May 2006
Posts: 373
Re: winter fuel payment
I think that by then it would be rather more than 140 pounds.
It is a really difficult conundrum for everyone that have quite a few years until they receive their pension. The problem with people providing their own pensions is how would they do it. The private sector has proved time and time again that they cannot be trusted to come forth with the money and even if they do what type of tinkering will future governments do. For every politician that says it will be ringfenced there is another who will change it.
Someone I know was going to buy a second house to use as a pension, great while prices rise but of what use would it be today presuming he could even sell the second house.
Anyone who thinks that they can pay for a pension using shares lives in cloud cuckoo land and has been proved to be useless over the years unless you are very lucky.
The next problem is the low and very low paid workers, how do they pay for a pension. They do some of the most important jobs for any society so do we just throw them out onto the street.
Unlike MT I would hate to see us back in the Victorian era.
Graham
It is a really difficult conundrum for everyone that have quite a few years until they receive their pension. The problem with people providing their own pensions is how would they do it. The private sector has proved time and time again that they cannot be trusted to come forth with the money and even if they do what type of tinkering will future governments do. For every politician that says it will be ringfenced there is another who will change it.
Someone I know was going to buy a second house to use as a pension, great while prices rise but of what use would it be today presuming he could even sell the second house.
Anyone who thinks that they can pay for a pension using shares lives in cloud cuckoo land and has been proved to be useless over the years unless you are very lucky.
The next problem is the low and very low paid workers, how do they pay for a pension. They do some of the most important jobs for any society so do we just throw them out onto the street.
Unlike MT I would hate to see us back in the Victorian era.
Graham
Maybe instead of expecting the state to provide our living costs as a right our entitlement, we start doing more for ourselves and by relying more on our extended families to help.....existing benefits should apply to help those who can't or don't have the means to help themselves.
#245
Banned
Joined: Aug 2009
Posts: 5,008
Re: winter fuel payment
I think that by then it would be rather more than 140 pounds.
It is a really difficult conundrum for everyone that have quite a few years until they receive their pension. The problem with people providing their own pensions is how would they do it. The private sector has proved time and time again that they cannot be trusted to come forth with the money and even if they do what type of tinkering will future governments do. For every politician that says it will be ringfenced there is another who will change it.
Someone I know was going to buy a second house to use as a pension, great while prices rise but of what use would it be today presuming he could even sell the second house.
Anyone who thinks that they can pay for a pension using shares lives in cloud cuckoo land and has been proved to be useless over the years unless you are very lucky.
The next problem is the low and very low paid workers, how do they pay for a pension. They do some of the most important jobs for any society so do we just throw them out onto the street.
Unlike MT I would hate to see us back in the Victorian era.
Graham
It is a really difficult conundrum for everyone that have quite a few years until they receive their pension. The problem with people providing their own pensions is how would they do it. The private sector has proved time and time again that they cannot be trusted to come forth with the money and even if they do what type of tinkering will future governments do. For every politician that says it will be ringfenced there is another who will change it.
Someone I know was going to buy a second house to use as a pension, great while prices rise but of what use would it be today presuming he could even sell the second house.
Anyone who thinks that they can pay for a pension using shares lives in cloud cuckoo land and has been proved to be useless over the years unless you are very lucky.
The next problem is the low and very low paid workers, how do they pay for a pension. They do some of the most important jobs for any society so do we just throw them out onto the street.
Unlike MT I would hate to see us back in the Victorian era.
Graham
#246
Banned
Joined: Aug 2009
Posts: 5,008
Re: winter fuel payment
Maybe instead of expecting the state to provide our living costs as a right our entitlement, we start doing more for ourselves and by relying more on our extended families to help.....existing benefits should apply to help those who can't or don't have the means to help themselves.
#247
Joined: Jun 2011
Location: In the middle of 10million Olive Trees
Posts: 12,053
Re: winter fuel payment
The following was taken from The Times letters to editor 21-10-11
Pension Poverty
Sir, I am saddened but not surprised to see MPs calling for the method of calculating state pension increases to be amended (by which I mean, of course, lowered). It seems to have been forgotten that pensioners already stand to lose 0.4 percent of their annual increase because of the change from RPI to CPI.
A single pensioner's minimum guaranteed weekly income is £137.35 but the official poverty level is £178 a week, and 83 percent of pensioner households receive the majority of their income from state pensions or benefits. After reduction in winter fuel payments and the increases in fuel prices many pensioners are contemplating the stark choice between food and heat.
David Smith
Chair, National Pensions Convention
Devon
Pension Poverty
Sir, I am saddened but not surprised to see MPs calling for the method of calculating state pension increases to be amended (by which I mean, of course, lowered). It seems to have been forgotten that pensioners already stand to lose 0.4 percent of their annual increase because of the change from RPI to CPI.
A single pensioner's minimum guaranteed weekly income is £137.35 but the official poverty level is £178 a week, and 83 percent of pensioner households receive the majority of their income from state pensions or benefits. After reduction in winter fuel payments and the increases in fuel prices many pensioners are contemplating the stark choice between food and heat.
David Smith
Chair, National Pensions Convention
Devon
#248
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Nov 2003
Location: Chiclana
Posts: 3,327
Re: winter fuel payment
Maybe instead of expecting the state to provide our living costs as a right our entitlement, we start doing more for ourselves and by relying more on our extended families to help.....existing benefits should apply to help those who can't or don't have the means to help themselves.
Uhhh the extended family are in the shit too except for those Directors who are now earning 50% more salary than a year ago but we are all in it together!
#249
BE Enthusiast
Joined: May 2006
Posts: 373
Re: winter fuel payment
No, it was in Spain and other Mediterranean countries until very recently....lower taxes and more choice and independence......why do you think countries are in so much debt? because they are forking out more than they are receiving....now look where we are at.
#250
Re: winter fuel payment
Why do you think so many head for the soft touch UK, it looks after them better than it's own!
At least Spain has the good sense not to through money away on non nationals unless they have contributed to the pot.
#251
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 5,368
Re: winter fuel payment
My neighbour is a teacher, retired on max pension after a full career teaching, deputy head, he's so burnt out he can only manage three days a week as a supply teacher! He likes to play golf on the other four. And he's far from alone, there are loads that teach for a few days a week as supply teachers, so not content with a full pension, they want to keep the would be teachers out of a job.
#252
Joined: Jun 2011
Location: In the middle of 10million Olive Trees
Posts: 12,053
Re: winter fuel payment
My neighbour is a teacher, retired on max pension after a full career teaching, deputy head, he's so burnt out he can only manage three days a week as a supply teacher! He likes to play golf on the other four. And he's far from alone, there are loads that teach for a few days a week as supply teachers, so not content with a full pension, they want to keep the would be teachers out of a job.
if there are all these teachers around why are the kids in classes of 25-30 when they could be in 15-20
better utilisation of rescources - both labour and money
#253
Re: winter fuel payment
My neighbour is a teacher, retired on max pension after a full career teaching, deputy head, he's so burnt out he can only manage three days a week as a supply teacher! He likes to play golf on the other four. And he's far from alone, there are loads that teach for a few days a week as supply teachers, so not content with a full pension, they want to keep the would be teachers out of a job.
#254
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 5,368
Re: winter fuel payment
You missed the irony, the smiley! Someone claimed that most are burnt out, I was just making the point that many aren't, even after retiring they still want to carry on working, earning more money. Still, they are on half term now, so another chance to recharge their batteries.
#255
Ex Expat
Joined: Oct 2006
Location: West Midlands, ex Granada province
Posts: 2,140
Re: winter fuel payment
You missed the irony, the smiley! Someone claimed that most are burnt out, I was just making the point that many aren't, even after retiring they still want to carry on working, earning more money. Still, they are on half term now, so another chance to recharge their batteries.
Towards the end of his career he found it so stressful and so full of unneccessary form filling and other admin, coupled with schools being classed as 'institutionally racist' because teachers would not allow children to call them 'man' or 'honkey', also no way to enforce discipline,that added to his health problems, he could stand it no more and took his (reduced by 1/3) pension as early as he could. And this was in the best non fee-paying school in our city.
He has not been in a classroom in any capacity since and would rather work in B and Q.
Most teachers I know have retired early. I only know one who carried on until 60, and by that time he had just been riot controlling for five years, (he was in one of the worst schools in our city) not even trying nor expecting to teach anything.
Last edited by scampicat; Oct 30th 2011 at 9:07 am.