CBI calls for work till 70

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) says the government should gradually raise the state pension age to 70 to fund an increase in the basic state pension to the level of Pensions Credit.

It is also urging employers and individuals to save more into pensions, and wants new employees to be automatically opted into pension schemes and new government incentives to boost savings.

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said employees would be "angry that their employers are suggesting they should work until they are 70 before they get a state pension, especially as the CBI are lobbying hard for 65 as the age at which employers can force people to retire".

The CBI also says employers "who can afford to" should contribute to pensions when their employees do. But the TUC view is that compulsion is "the only way" to get the many employers who provide no pension at all to make a proper contribution to what it calls the "pensions partnership between state, employer and employee".