Is it time to tackle the public sector pensions time bomb?

[tonkatoy]

The cost of public sector pensions is spiraling out of control. The funds are no longer adequate to provide the index linked pensions to public sector workers, putting a massive future tax burden on the rest of the poulation at a time when their own pension funds are collapsing.

 

Is it time for the Government to bite the bullet and stop this madness now?

 

Top (private sector) firms' pension funds plummet

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8184695.stm

 

 

£1 trillion bill for public sector pensions

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/pensions/article.html?in_article_id=407513&in_page_id=6

[Minimo]

Labour won't do it, it would cost them votes. They'll leave it to the Tories to have to be the nasty party and sort out the mess Labour have made.

[barny_100]

I posted some links in this thread that are relevant:

 

http://www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=459208

 

Basic answer is to end final salary schemes for the majority of public sector positions, well those that aren't "let go" in the great and much needed State Spending reductions of 2010-15 anyway

[crookesey]

Well is it finally happening? Did they actualy think that the rest of us were daft enough to work until we drop in order to let them retire at age 60, at the very latest, and draw their gold plated final salary pensions funded by us.

 

When I say 'funded by us' they pay circa 6% of salary and recieve up to 40% tax relief on this measly amount, this will hardly fund their tax-free lump sums, let alone their inflation linked pensions.

 

Brown taxed private pension funds to the tune of £5 billion a year, in order to fund the creation of even more public sector jobs, along with the benefits that go with them.

[Rupert_Baehr]

I wonder whether MPs will be reducing their own pensions?

 

AFAIR, they award themselves an index-linked 1/40th of final salary per year worked. And they don't have to work for 20-30 years to get it, either.

[max]

Who's getting these gold plated pensions? Someone I know worked for 27 years in a fairly senior position and their pension is less than £9k a year, hardly the gold plating that the right wing press seem intent on persuading is rampant.

[Longcol]

Well is it finally happening? Did they actualy think that the rest of us were daft enough to work until we drop in order to let them retire at age 60, at the very latest, and draw their gold plated final salary pensions funded by us.

 

When I say 'funded by us' they pay circa 6% of salary and recieve up to 40% tax relief on this measly amount, this will hardly fund their tax-free lump sums, let alone their inflation linked pensions.

 

Brown taxed private pension funds to the tune of £5 billion a year, in order to fund the creation of even more public sector jobs, along with the benefits that go with them.

 

Where do you get the 6% from - I was paying more than that 30 years ago in the NHS.

[crookesey]

Who's getting these gold plated pensions? Someone I know worked for 27 years in a fairly senior position and their pension is less than £9k a year, hardly the gold plating that the right wing press seem intent on persuading is rampant.

 

The person in question probably paid circa £15,000 net of tax relief in personal contributions. I've paid circa £40,000 net of tax relief into a personal pension, it will pay circa £3,500 a year if inflation linked and with spouses benefits. I can uplift it to circa £5,000 a year if I waive inflation linking and spouses benefits.

 

The person you mention will get circa £14.000 p/a including the state pension, and it will increase in line with earnings and supply some spouses benefits.

 

You were saying.

[crookesey]

Where do you get the 6% from - I was paying more than that 30 years ago in the NHS.

 

Up to £20709 = 6%

£20709 to £68392 = 6.50%

£68392 to £107846 = 7.50%

+ £107846 = 8.50%

 

Congratulations on being paid such a good salary for all those years.

[truman]

Up to £20709 = 6%

£20709 to £68392 = 6.50%

£68392 to £107846 = 7.50%

+ £107846 = 8.50%

 

Congratulations on being paid such a good salary for all those years.

 

I'm sure I read that the civil service only pay 1.5% ?

 

"..However, depending on what workers earn and which scheme they are part of, not all scheme members would be asked to double their contributions. Members of the police scheme already pay 9pc of their salary on average, one of the highest rates in the public sector and six times the typical contribution from a civil service scheme member...."