Biscuitman

Sorry C_steam, hadn't replied to yours....

Here's another view...

To re-establish the link between pensions and National Average Earnings -effectively giving single pensioners £25, (rather than being linked to RPI and falling further behind)... would cost £10.8 billion.

Deduct the cost of means tested benefits at £6.0 billion, (another aside - I'm full of em I'm afraid - £1 billion builds a hospital and provides a capital sum to pay for the running of that hospital in perpetuity), gives an annual cost of £4.8 billion.... to pay for this would cost 1.5% on the NI stamp.... or ...now what was that amount you are stripping out of pensions each year Gordon....

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IF THE EU WAS THE ANSWER, IT MUST HAVE BEEN A STUPID QUESTION!

B.A.Ware

Can any one tell me how the maths add up. £30 million a day would not give the 11 million pensioners £25 per week it would give approximately £19 per week. How are we going to pay for our other polices. i for one am not happy about giving out leaflets that lie. :cry: :cry:

Bobby-Veritas's Boy

I'm no`t a wiz when it comes to maths but this is how I see the sums are being worked out. At the moment the less well off pensioners sometimes qualify for Income Support, so they receive two payments, the State pension and Income Support. The I.S. is means tested and you have to be below a certain level before you qualify.
Now should the State Pension be increased by £25 per week this will lift many pensioners above the I.S. qualifying level, thus saving the government money on I.S. which will then be used to top up the pension short fall. As the most vunerable pensioners are the ones just above the I.S. qualifying levels this could be seen as the best way to help this particular group of people. Having said this I'm probably totally wrong.

Biscuitman

The £11 billion withdrawal windfall is small beer compared to the costs of regulation... £100 Billion a year, we couldn't strip all of that out of the system but we can cut at least one third.

Read section five of my paper at ;-

http://www.ukipforum.co.uk/viewtopic...b1a92f8c2efb78

It has the full costings

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IF THE EU WAS THE ANSWER, IT MUST HAVE BEEN A STUPID QUESTION!

B.A.Ware

Perhaps I was not making myself clear regardless of were we get the money the leaflet states that £30 million per day would equate to £25 per week per pensioner. How is any one going to take us seriously when we can’t even do our basic maths. I think this is a good policy, which should be clearly costed, just to say we will find the money from money we might save on EU regulations is not good enough. I’m sure if Jeremy Paxton was to interview one of are MEP’s on the subject we would look foolish. :? :? :?

Biscuitman

We dont intend to pay for the pension increase with the withdrawal windfall. The Alan Bown card is wrong in that respect and I suspect that the 25 quid a week figure was a 'me too' idea as thats what the others are talking about.

The big difference is that we are the ONLY party who will have the money to pay the increase and when the others take us completely INTO phpbb_the Eu then our pensioners will be paying 60% tax to support Eu pensioners.


Read Bobby's Boy's reply BA, its as good an explanation as anything.

Plus, Contracting Out rebates cost the Revenue £11 Billion a year, under the new scheme there would be no need for Contracting Out.

Again read part five of my paper especially:-

T"he amount of the SSS to be, £105.00 for each pensioner. This being 22% of National Average Earnings and that link to changeable only by referendum. Payable from age 65.

The gross cost of this will be in £ Billions in 2004/05 terms.

2006/07 19.4 2007/08 20.7 2008/09 22.1 2009/10 23.5 2010/11 25.0 2011/12 26.2 2012/13 28.6 2013/14 30.5 2014/15 32.4 2015/16 34.2

But as SERPS will be scrapped we can deduct the cost of SERPS rebates. This amounts to 1% of GDP in 2004 reducing to 0.4% in 2041. We can also deduct accrued State pension rights, and there will be a reduction in Housing Benefit and Council tax Benefit and the cost of The Pension Credit. This brings the costs down to, (where a negative figure is shown, that is actually a saving over what the present regime will cost): -

2006/07 -5.2 2007/08 -4.0 2008/09 -3.5 2009/10 -3.0 2010/11 -2.4 2011/12 –1.9 2012/13 -0.8 2013/14 -0.1 2014/15 +0.6 2015/16 +1.2

In the first 10 years there is a saving of 19.1 Billion over the current regime.

Bear in mind that the above figures are based on £105 per person.

If we adopt the New Zealand format then married couples, or two people financially dependant on each other, would receive a joint pension of 150% of a single pensions and single pensioners living with others, either family or co-habiting, house sharing, then they receive 90% of the single rate.

If we adopt this model then the cost falls within the totals tabulated above and we could afford a Single pensioner rate could be increased to 25% of NAE at £115 per week, the married rate would be £172.50 and the Living with others rate would be £103.50.

£115.00 per week is 60% of the median rate of a single pensioner in the UK today which is used as the ‘official’ poverty line I would recommend the adoption of this second option. How can we set out to pay pensioners an amount that is less than the ‘official’ poverty level?

However, I did say we had the chance to lay foundations for the long term.

The ‘baby boom’ bulge in the population reaches a peak in 2041 so we have to look beyond the next 35 years. The longer term costs of implementing the SSS over and above current state pension costs are, (without taking INTO phpbb_account Housing Benefit & Council Tax Rebates and Increases in Income Tax revenues, -the baby boomers are going to arrive at retirement with more assets than previous generations).

Expressed as % of GDP: -

2023 +1.3% 2033 +2.2% 2043 +2.8% 2053 +2.9%

So we need to find an extra 2.9% over the next 50 years. This can be achieved by using one or more of the following options."

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IF THE EU WAS THE ANSWER, IT MUST HAVE BEEN A STUPID QUESTION!

Biscuitman

Have you seen my leaflet BA, the one most of us are using?

If not then send me an e-mail to biscuitman@thebrainsurgery.co.uk

You might be a lot happier using mine with the Alan Bown one.

__________________
IF THE EU WAS THE ANSWER, IT MUST HAVE BEEN A STUPID QUESTION!

B.A.Ware

Biscuitman
I have read your 16-page document and it comes up with some very good ideas but what I want is something I can say on the doorstep, nothing to technical just a few figures I can bat back at people if they question me about the Alan browns leaflet. One example if we are to give pensioners £25 per week we would stop their heating allowance this would put an estimated 1.1 billion back in the coffers, how much would be saved by removing top ups and benefits. A question I have already been asked is do people on £1000s a week get the £25 as well, and if we remove the benefits for some pensioners will they be any better off. :?: :?: :?:

Biscuitman

Any pension increase is across the board.

The fact that mega rich pensioners, such as MPs and Whitehall Mandarins get it as well may seem harsh, but increasing the flat rate is the only way to lift people out of means tested benefits.

And, those on big pensions will be paying tax on their pensions and by virtue of having accumulated bigger pension pots will have paid more tax in their working lives.

the mega pensions are relatively few and far between, most personal pension pots of retirees at the moment have £20-£30k in them, (as a rough guide divide by 12 for the annual pension that would give.

However, because of the efforts of insurance and pensions salesmen since the 1980s, despite the bad press, we are now seeing pots of £75k to £100k increasing in number.

The state pension is to be a GUARANTEED minimum against ABSOLUTE poverty and we must do all that we can to ensure that people make additional provision, either through company or personal pensions/savings if they want more comfort.

Its a traade off between spending money now or when you retire.

the problem for Gordon Brown is that, although he castigates us for not saving enough he ABSOLUTELY needs us to be spending to keep the economy going.

How do you like my leaflet "What They don't Want You To Know About Your Pension"?

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IF THE EU WAS THE ANSWER, IT MUST HAVE BEEN A STUPID QUESTION!

B.A.Ware

Top leaflet why can’t ukip post it on their web site. As I said in my email I am going to take it to my branch meeting tomorrow 13/01/2005 and show the rest of the committee one of which works in head office, I will ask him if it should be used nationallyif you dont mind.