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Keir Starmer


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What are peoples thoughts on means testing for the state pension?

 

Rachel Reeves has appointed this fella as an advisor. 

 

In an interview with LBC in July, Sir Edward said of the state pension: “Should you means test it? I mean yes there is still a link that you pay your National Insurance and you do get more state pension if you contribute more. But the link is very light now, and by and large we have a universal benefit of state pension.”

He continued: “We can all think of the wealthy individuals in this country and say, well, do we think he or she should have a full state pension? Or if the public finances are in a bit of a state, perhaps he or she should be giving that up? So, there is a debate to be had

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Nah you shouldn't means test if you've paid NI, if you're a billionaire and you've paid NI then you should get your pension.

 

The winter fuel allowance is different as it was added by Labour "on top" of other things and should have been means tested from the word go, but it was probably just too hard to administer.

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39 minutes ago, Numero Veinticinco said:

No. That’s my thought. It’s not to say that the very wealthy are going to need it, but it’s a slippery slope. It then gives successive governments the option of playing with the threshold. Fuck that. 

 

37 minutes ago, Section_31 said:

Nah you shouldn't means test if you've paid NI, if you're a billionaire and you've paid NI then you should get your pension.

 

The winter fuel allowance is different as it was added by Labour "on top" of other things and should have been means tested from the word go, but it was probably just too hard to administer.


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4 hours ago, Section_31 said:

Nah you shouldn't means test if you've paid NI, if you're a billionaire and you've paid NI then you should get your pension.

 

 

 

I agree strongly with the first paragraph it's a huge part of the social contract. 

 

Are you not concerned that the same argument being used against rich pensioners for the WFA is what will be used to attack the last hanging....

 

Example, there are 1 million future retirees who can retire with a private pension of well in excess of over 50k  every year which is around 5 times the state pension. They don't need it. Incrementalism, they start with small steps and hey we end up with 10k tuition fees. Make no mistake influential people across both Labour and Conservative have their eye on clawing some of this back.

 

 

pension-spending-forecast-uk-1000x563-jp

 

 

 

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The winter fuel payment was an additional benefit that wasn't means tested and given to everyone, so it's not really the same as something like state pension. You pay into a pension, so you should get something back.

 

The winter fuel payment would be like giving a free school meal to everyone, regardless of their parents' income - including kids at Eton college - then deciding a few years later that the county was broke and you couldn't afford it, so means testing it for poor kids, them everyone starting petitions and accusing you of 'starving the kids'. 

 

Reform want to scrap the NHS, let's see how that goes down with the blue rinse brigade form Essex, given  that they probably account for about 80% of its resources. 

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Just now, Section_31 said:

The winter fuel payment was an additional benefit that wasn't means tested and given to everyone, so it's not really the same as something like state pension. You pay into a pension, so you should get something back.

 

The winter fuel payment would be like giving a free school meal to everyone, regardless of their parents' income - including kids at Eton college - then deciding a few years later that the county was broke and you couldn't afford it, so means testing it for poor kids, them everyone starting petitions and accusing you of 'starving the kids'. 

 

Reform want to scrap the NHS, let's see how that goes down with the blue rinse brigade form Essex, given  that they probably account for about 80% of its resources. 

I am wondering if there will even be a state in pension say as little maybe as even 20 years time?

 

The numbers look truly grim and it appears to be potentially unsustainable.

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10 minutes ago, an tha said:

I am wondering if there will even be a state in pension say as little maybe as even 20 years time?

 

The numbers look truly grim and it appears to be potentially unsustainable.

 

We can sustain anything, covid proved that, half the planet was sat at home watching telly and everything carried on moving. Economies are man made, we can make them do whatever we want, sadly it's not "our" decision, it's the banks. They rebrand their bad bonds good and good debt bad, depending on when it suits them.

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1 minute ago, Section_31 said:

 

We can sustain anything, covid proved that, half the planet was sat at home watching telly and everything carried on moving. Economies are man made, we can make them do whatever we want, sadly it's not "our" decision, it's the banks. They rebrand their bad bonds good and good debt bad, depending on when it suits them.

Very fair.

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Wow

 

When we came into office – we immediately conducted an audit of public finances and we found a £22bn black hole.

Now – the independent Office of National Statistics has conducted vital work on the state of immigration and found the previous government were running an open borders experiment.

As the ONS sets out, nearly one million people came to Britain in the year ending June 2023. That is four times the migration levels compared with 2019.

Time and again – the Conservative party promised they would get those numbers down. Time and again – they failed.

And now the chorus of excuses has begun. We heard that from the leader of the opposition, yesterday.

But what we didn’t hear what the British people are owed is an explanation.

Because a failure on this scale isn’t just bad luck it isn’t a global trend or taking your eye off the ball.

No – this a different order of failure. This happened by design, not accident.

Policies were reformed deliberately to liberalise immigration.

Brexit was used for that purpose to turn Britain into a one-nation experiment in open borders.

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3 hours ago, Arniepie said:

Wow

 

When we came into office – we immediately conducted an audit of public finances and we found a £22bn black hole.

Now – the independent Office of National Statistics has conducted vital work on the state of immigration and found the previous government were running an open borders experiment.

As the ONS sets out, nearly one million people came to Britain in the year ending June 2023. That is four times the migration levels compared with 2019.

Time and again – the Conservative party promised they would get those numbers down. Time and again – they failed.

And now the chorus of excuses has begun. We heard that from the leader of the opposition, yesterday.

But what we didn’t hear what the British people are owed is an explanation.

Because a failure on this scale isn’t just bad luck it isn’t a global trend or taking your eye off the ball.

No – this a different order of failure. This happened by design, not accident.

Policies were reformed deliberately to liberalise immigration.

Brexit was used for that purpose to turn Britain into a one-nation experiment in open borders.

 

Are they quotes from someone? I've had a quick look in the news & don't see them & I'm assuming you're not a government spokesperson.

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59 minutes ago, Mook said:

 

Are they quotes from someone? I've had a quick look in the news & don't see them & I'm assuming you're not a government spokesperson.


Full transcript of the PM’s speech: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-speech-on-migration-28-november-2024

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