Monday 30 May 2016

WELCOME TO MISERY FOR BRITISH OAPs


There's an on-line petition... here.

It won't of course do any good, but I guess it does't hurt to let them know that we are aware that most other countries treat their pensioners with a bit more respect than the UK does.

32 comments:

  1. A leaflet like this should have been posted through every door before the Indy ref. Not enough was done to counter the lies about pensions.
    I hope lessons were learned.

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    1. For those of us currently in receipt of the state pension,we receive around £6000.
      How people survive on that alone is beyond me.
      Loss of pensions was a successful ruse used by disreputable politicians during the referendum as a means of reinforcing the doubts many felt about "separating" from mother England.
      The screams from the wealthy middle classes on currency ("where is your plan B?") were a prop to their instinctive unionism and have proved to be just that (Mervyn King recently confirmed that Plan A would have worked quite well).
      Unfortunately,we have too many people who have known nothing other than an uncaring society,austerity and a diminishing welfare system and accept that as being inevitable.
      So,that £7488 state pension quoted is probably as good as it is going to get unless Westminster is kicked into touch.

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    2. I will have to survive on the basic pension. Due to losing my job, i've had to empty my small pension pot to pay off my mortgage and other debts.

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    3. Did they finally pay you off Jutie?

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    4. Nope. Still left out to dry. Eight weeks now without any pay and my boss doesn't have the decency to make me redundant. I will have to fight for it through a tribunal, and that could take 10 months. To fight for my redundancy pay means resigning and going the legal route. Because i have to resign, that means my Jobeekers Allowance and my mortgage redundancy insurance will stop as i have nade myself unemployed.
      Welcome to Tory Scotland.
      Look out for this appearing in the Tele

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    5. I'm really sorry to hear that, Jutie. It seems a completely ridiculous situation.

      Have to spoken to Stewart or Chris?

      Are there any colleagues in the same boat?

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    6. There are 6 of us 'laid off'.
      I don't think any SNP folk can change UK employment law.

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    7. NO they can't but sometimes a letter from an MP may encourage people to behave more humanly. Maybe the telegraph can do that too.

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  2. Agreed. When they said pensions were only safe with the UK,they might have mentioned what a crap pension it was.

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  3. I imagine, Bringiton, that that figure includes any of the add ons that they have added on throughout the years. SERPS was one, I think. I expect, in fairness, the same treatment was given to the other countries' figures.

    I doubt you can survive on £6000 a year. So it you have nothing else, you are forced, after a life time's work, to go cap in hand to the government for pension credit, and to the council for tax rebate... and of course, have George Osborne screaming "scrounger" in your ear.

    Still, you have the excitement of a bonus to look forward to when you are 80. An extra 25p a week.

    Now you can spend your retirement planning what to do with the extra 25p weekly.

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    1. I worked in high-value industries { oil rig construction,petro-chem. and power generation throughout the SERPS period. The figures given do not include Serps. My actual state pension is £940 every four weeks =£12220 or equivalent to Australia.

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    2. @Anon.
      The extra SERPS payment was stopped years ago.

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    3. Good heavens. You must have been putting a fortune away in SERPS. Anyone else get that kinda of pension? Everyone I know is on somewhere between £110 and £150 a week. Nothing like yours.

      I wonder where they came up with average income in UK at £31,000.

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    4. Juteman--SERPS finished in 2005. It ran for 28 years if my memory serves me. Tris--A classic example is the tax year 1991/92. I was working on the Brent field at the time and my P60 gave a total of £31,200. Tax and NI took £5,300 of that

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    5. Good money for that time Anon. Of course the job would have been hard, and to an extent hazardous and I'm sure the money was well deserved, but compared to Mr/Ms Average it was a good income. At that time people were working for £1 an hour in fast food shops. £37 a week. Around £2,000 a year.

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  4. I know this is a stinker of a question but I have always wanted to know how comparisons on pensions stack up when contributions to health services are taken into account.

    In Scotland and the UK as a whole (at present) we basically have a free at point of use health service but paid for out of national insurance and prescriptions charges (and taxes?). Elsewhere they pay for health services separately. If this is taken into account does the UK move up or down on this list?

    Can anyone clarify or point to a useful link?

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    1. That would be a hugely complex exercise, although I grant you, an interesting one.

      Every country, EU or not (they don't interfere with everything) has its own way of doing things. I remember from my days in France, how complicated it was, for a foreigner at least, to understand what you had to do. A bureaucratic nightmare.

      I think in most states health care for the elderly is free, but I could be far wide of the mark.

      I'd appreciate the comments of anyone living in other countries, including the Channel Islands.

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  5. Looking at the government's page on pensions, I noted that prescriptions are free in England for those over 60. It notes that they are free for everyone in the rest of the UK.

    So, when Ms Lamont was going on about "something for nothing" and how rich people could easily afford their prescription charges, did she ask her colleague in Wales why he was handing out state aid to what she must have considered "something for nothing" people in Wales?

    He had the power to charge whatever he wanted, surely?

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  6. "It won't of course do any good"

    Pensioners enjoy the triple lock, greater increases than provided by any gov't since Callaghan. And the Tories delivered it. But please, don't let facts get in your way.

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    1. I accept that, but it doesn't really mean a thing, Dean. They start as such a low base. By comparison with average earnings British pensions are the lowest in the developed world,except for mexico. A proud boast no matter how many locks you put on them... and when is someone going to work out that giving people an extra 25p to cover the expenses that go with being over 80, is insulting.

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  7. Go on ignoring the many SNP MP scandals, with a self serving relativism. 'Cos to 27 y/o Scots voters, obviously bleating on about 'Mrs T' is somehow relevant...

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    1. Hi Dean. What "scandals" would those be then? Any convictions in a criminal court? Any prosecutions in a criminal court?

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    2. As Conan says, Dean, what have we got here? Are police forces all over the country investigating the SNP MPs? It seems not. No one has been near either of them.

      We have a few people who have had their cases blown up by the unionist press and, of course the BBC, and we have two SNP MPs who were unfaithful to their partners with adults. Any Tories ever done that?

      The Daily Mail and The Daily Express have made much of it, of course, trying to suggest that because the presumed sexual part of the affair was conducted in properties paid for by the tax payer, that we someone paid for their affairs. For heaven's sake. Lord knows how much we've paid out for Charles and Andrews affairs then!

      But as I've said before, it seems to me that the so called criminal investigations into both Michelle and Nathalie haven't interested the police, despite the press's best efforts. And although I'd have preferred that the MPs kept their trousers up round their waists, their affairs were with a middle aged female journalist.

      Now compare that with some of the unionist parties.

      We have something in the order of 28 Tory MPs being investigated by the police for fraud. And I shudder to imagine what some MPs have been doing in the trouser department.

      As for Mrs T, well, I don't bleat much about her, but her legacy of stupidity when it came to rearranging the UK economy in the 1980s still affects all of us. I guess some people don't know that, but it is true. Had only Mrs Thatcher had half the wit of her German counterparts we would have the mixed economy that Osborne wishes we had. And if she has invested the oil money instead of squandering it, we might have been able to afford to keep pensioners out of penury.

      People who have or had no jobs because the only industry mrs Thatcher favoured was finance, may remember her.

      People who would have been welders, fitters, fabricators, steel makers, miners, ship builders... but ended their lives unemployed or as call centre workers, may remember her. There are areas where she is as popular as The Sun is in Liverpool.

      People who are on waiting lists for council houses, but can't get one because there are hardly any, may also remember her.

      So, maybe she doesn't impact on your life, but I can assure you that there are many for whom she is, and will always be the wicked witch of the south.

      Ask your colleague, Malcolm Rifkind about her if he's not too busy making money out of his past.

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    3. I remember that woman, and what she did to communities; up and down this country. Aided by her sniveling lackies, they f****d this country for generations to come, for jam today band sod all tomorrow.
      Dean is just shouting "squirrel", to make you look away from how s**t this union is.

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    4. LOl... no not bad. The rest is right though.

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  8. Tris

    Is Dean the new Niko, just less funny. I always thought Dean was Labour but saying that Labour/Tory are the same thing and equally as useless.

    The Pension situation is not new, if the UK paid decent, honest and respectful pensions old people will live even longer and that won't do and the retirement age will go up to 95 or something.

    This country has been on the slippery slope since 1979 and while Dean might be right that many don't know Thatcher they sure as hell know her policies as they are living under them in the nightmare that is neo liberal UK. This country could not give a shit about the people not part of the club, it is a shameful and disgusting state of affairs and the fact that many believe the shit they are served or don't take an interest means they are as big a part of the problem.

    I get angrier and more disgusted everyday, we are all suffering and seeing our few remaining rights eroded more and more every year. I feel for Juteman because there is no protection anymore unless you are wealthy. Sometimes when I talk to people the ignorance, the lack of compassion or the plain hatred for the poor breaks your heart. I hate this country for what it accepts and how they would not piss on us if we were on fire.

    Unreal.

    Bruce

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    1. It's true that some people have no clue what is going on Bruce, and that others may have some idea and just don't care. Of course with the BBC refusing to cover stories like the election fraud allegations what can you expect.

      SNP aren't just bad these days, they're evil!

      If Thatcher had been less obsessed with the City of London and more interested in Wales, the North and Scotland, things might be more like they are in Germany.

      She simply didn't have a clue about people. She saw them as commodities to be used to make money.

      Stupid, stupid woman.

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  9. "Stupid, stupid woman"? You are far too kind, Tris. She was a thoroughly evil woman who won an election on the corpses of the deal and deserves to be regarded with the utmost contempt. Quite curious that she and Blair profited from the blood of the victims,

    Was in 'civilisation' for a couple of weeks enjoying the Sunshine on Leith and the odd scrumpy in Somerset. Kept looking for the Spook and his buddy Niko at the cup final but they must have been keeping a low profile....

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    1. Yes, I know. It's too serious to call her less than she was. I'm not sure how much of it was stupidity, complete lack of understanding of people and how they operated, and how much was evil.. a real disregard for the effects of what she was doing and a detachment from the fact that she was killing people. I'm not even sure how much of it was Denis and his mates' greed.

      I understand that the sunshine was even stronger on your wee islands, and some people were even enjoying it, much to the concern of the meenister. Why some of the women even had the temerity to hitch up their long skirts and let a little sunshine onto their legs putting temptation in the way of the men.

      What will it all lead to?

      Spook and Niko? They were probably the ones that caused the rammy.

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  10. Tris, I have paid money thought my life into the UK Pension Pot. AFAIK I get a pension of around £12000 per annum, having probably contributed, in todays money, around 7.5% of my income into a pot called National Insurance.

    What the heck did they do with it?

    This was out of an income, in todays money, averaged over a lifetime, of approx £20,000 per annum. Which would add up to a substantial capital sum.

    Did I get a great deal or a shitty deal out of the government?

    I'd have thought that just investing that money almost anywhere other that with the British Government would have boosted my pension enormously.

    It is pretty clear that my pension is now being paid for from future generations, which is utterly wrong. I would like to be comfortable about my income from the state. I am not, if it robs, as it does, my children, then it is ridiculous.

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    1. The UK decided that it wouldn't fund the pensions, either from contributions, or from the massive monies that came from the North Sea.

      Children born today won;t get a state pension, I'm guessing. They will have to go on working till they drop, or have provided for themselves by way of private pensions.

      Oh the opportunities lost....

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