Retirement age deal needs rethink: Brown

Retirement age deal needs rethink: Brown

	Published : Tue, 29 Nov 2005 14:15 By : David Simms Print this Story

LONDON: Chancellor Gordon Brown yesterday agreed to review the Government’s deal allowing public sector workers to retire at 60 even as Trade and Industry secretary Alan Johnson said that the deal would not be reopened.

Johnson assured thousands of public sector workers that the Government would not renege on its deal. Business leaders were - on the one hand upset that Downing Street decided to go ahead with this ‘unfair deal’; and on the other hand were happy that Brown and Blair did not regard it as a signed and sealed deal.

Sir Digby Jones, chief of the CBI was particularly pleased that Brown had “left the door open” suggesting that the Government would review its earlier decision taken under pressure from unions threatening a nationwide stir.

Meanwhile Johnson insisted that he could ‘guarantee’ that the Government would not back out. Mr Johnson had negotiated with the public sector workers unions who opposed a proposal to raise the retirement age to 65. He termed the deal as a “very good, very fair, very reasonable and very sane agreement”.

Johnson explained that it would lead to £13 billion in savings for the Treasury, a point Brown repeated at the CBI conference suggesting he did not share the minister’s unequivocal position.

The CBI chief said it was unfair that private sector workers had to work on even after 60 while the public sector workers could start enjoying their retirement.

Brown’s receptiveness indicated that the deal with the public sector unions would be reexamined. He said that any decision on pensions would affect future generations of people hence it was important to make sure it is not influenced by political considerations. The pensions policy will have to have a national consensus.

Brown appeared to agree with business leaders that a national consensus would be not be possible with the Government’s “two tier system” where public sector workers retired at 60 while private sector workers continued to work until 67.