 |
Welcome
to the
Greater London
Pensioners Association
|
Interchange
Studios, Hampstead Town Hall Centre,
213 Haverstock Hill, London NW3 4QP
Telephone: 0207209 3084
Download and read the GLPA appeal -
now!
The GLPA exists to campaign - to defend - to advance
all the interests of
pensioners, including the level of the pension, the standards of the NHS,
extent and cost of Community Care and Social Services and the retention
and extension of the Travel Permit.
We are totally opposed to any means
testing and demand that the elderly should be able to enjoy their later
years with justice and dignity.
In all its activities, an
underlying objective is to ensure equality of treatment and solidarity
between the generations in general and particularly through the Trade
Unions.
The GLPA Newsletter, "The Greater London
Pensioner", is produced monthly and a wide variety of leaflets are
produced and distributed to inform and encourage action. Petitions
dealing with pensioners' grievances are produced and presented to the
Prime Minister.
Membership consists of individuals (annual subscription £5) and
organisations (annual subscription a minimum of £10). Persons
below the age of 60 can become Associate Members. Amongst our
membership are Trade Union Regions, Age Concern London and the Greater
London Association of Trade Union Councils.
MEETING
GLPA delegate meetings are held at 1.30 p.m. on the last Friday in
each month (excluding December) in the Council Chamber at Camden Town
Hall (Judd Street entrance) on Euston Road, opposite St. Pancras Station.
At these meetings pensioners' issues are discussed. Observers are
always welcome. Help us to save
the basic state pension!
This is YOUR
future state pension!
The basic retirement pension is in
real terms falling year on year. In 1982 it was 22.7 per cent
of the average wage. Today it is around 15 per cent. In 2040
it will have fallen to just 10 per cent.
As this deliberate phasing out takes
place - millions in work today are being encouraged to take out
private pensions as their main source of retirement income.
Today's generation of pensioners are
being means tested in order to receive a top-up supplement to their run
down meagre basic pension.
It is true that pensioners have been
awarded a cold weather payment (for each household, not each pensioner)
and those over 75 are now given a free TV. License.
What is not common knowledge is that
in 1980 the government ended the earnings-related link to pensions. That
has resulted in a weekly loss today for pensioners of between £25 to
£30.
Those government one-off hand-outs do
not compensate today's' pensioners for that loss.
We campaign for an immediate,
substantial increase in the basic pension - linked to earnings or
prices, whichever is highest.
Join us now and help us in the
campaign to save the basic retirement pension!
YOUR basic retirement pension!!
We are fighting for YOUR future!!
You will ALL be pensioners one
day!!
From The President
There can be little doubt that since the Thatcher Government
(1980), mounted its first attack on what we used to refer to as
the social wage, pensioners collectively have borne the greater
losses.
The one thing that Governments virtually ignore is that the
majority of pensioners after five or six years of retirement, are
worse off relative to those still at work It was inevitable that
once the link with earnings was broken, this would be the
consequence.
If you really think about it, is this State robbery of pensioners
- even if it is covered by the Fig Leaf of an act of Parliament,
more acceptable than many of the losses afflicted on some
pensioners by the unions, private insurance and pension companies?
Its right that we support those that take action against the
companies, but we must not forget that this over concentration on
schemes other than the State Retirement Pension is the main cause
of today's pension panic.
We know that had the link with earnings not been abolished the
single pension would now be £ 105, that is more than the MIG will
be in April. So we can see that even with the advent of the
Pension Credit, we have a further anomaly to contend with, a
single pension at £77.45 and the MIG at £102, the former still
linked to the Retail Price Index and the latter to earnings, this
will produce a difference of £25.55 a week.
If that same principle is to be applied over a lengthy period of
time, this gap will grow ever bigger, so much so that a
significant minority of those in work today would be no better off
if they saved nothing and relied on the Pensioner Credit to
provide for their retirement. Of course that is not going to
happen, the Pensioner Credit will be amended within five years.
In any means testing system there will be those that gain and no
one denies them that, but is an extension of means testing the way
ahead for the 21 Century?
We used to talk about protection from `Cradle to the Grave'.
Now we enter a new era of means testing from `Cradle to the
Grave'. Is that the best we can expect from this Government?
Eddie Richardson
President GLPA
|
