Buzz: Government urged to 'triple lock' S2P

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The industry believes the government should extend its triple lock guarantee of the basic state pension to cover additional state benefits.

Half of this week's Pension Buzz respondents thought all accrued state benefits should be uprated by this mechanism. However, a quarter of respondents thought this would be too costly.

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Question: Should uprating of accrued S2P/SERPs be guaranteed by the government's 'triple lock'?screen-shot-2013-02-27-at-175

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For many contributors it was a matter of fairness, and anything other than the triple lock would be "yet another government raid" as one advocate put it.

"It is disgraceful that people who have paid their state earnings related pensions in good faith should have the associated pension whittled away," said one respondent.

Another contributor pointed out that people in receipt of SERPS or the state second pensions had no ability to save more to compensate for any loss of increase in payments.

Respondents were particular concerned that the "professional middle classes" would lose out relative to other groups if additional benefits were not uprated in line with the basic state pension.

"The ‘squeezed middle' will take another hit, the wealthier will be broadly immune and the poorer savers will be better off at their expense," explained a worried contributor.

One respondent who didn't want to see the triple lock introduced for these benefits was worried that such a move would lead to pressure for contracted-out benefits to be uprated in the same way.

But most people who were against extending the triple lock were no fans of the idea in the first place.

One contributor explained: "It is unaffordable as it is without adding more to it. Pensioners - especially wealthy ones - have been overly protected against the economic problems."

"The triple lock is a silly arrangement designed solely to buy the grey vote," added another critic. "Why should we increase the £1trn plus national debt to give more money to a generation that has benefited the most from windfall house price rises and defined benefit schemes?"

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