Thursday, 25 October 2012  Dangerous precedents  According to
his Wikipedia entry, Lord Bichard spent most of his working life
in the public sector.  During that time, he no doubt contributed
to various public sector pension schemes, and now enjoys the
benefits of those schemes.  I wonder how he’d feel if the
managers of those schemes suggested that he should lose part of
his pension if he refused to volunteer for unpaid work?  That
doesn’t seem to me to be very different from what he has
suggested should happen to state pensioners.  It might be argued
that the state pension scheme has never been actuarially sound,
and that the contributions made have never been enough to
support the level of benefits promised to pensioners.  That
would be true; but those in receipt of, or expecting to receive,
state pensions are hardly to blame for the fact that those
managing their pensions promised them certain benefits and never
took enough money from either the employees or the employers to
pay for them. From the pension