Pensions Commission

Baroness Coffey Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

Yes. The single best guarantee of a happy retirement is a happy working life where people have the opportunity to earn enough money and to save enough money. We absolutely are doing huge amounts—I will not recite it all here as I have done many times before—and investing in all kinds of programmes to get people into work and to get them to progress in work and to be able to move up the income ladder to be able to save. However, one thing we know is that too many people are not working long enough to save or saving enough when they are in work and, in many cases, even if they put the right amount of saving in, the decisions they make at the point they come to retire—decumulation—can be crucial to how much they get to live on. We have to attack it on all fronts; no one of those alone will do it.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

Will the Minister rule out the state pension age ever being 70, despite what the commission and others might say, recognising that the pace of the increase in life expectancy has slowed considerably?

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, the law is clear at the moment. The state pension age is now gradually rising from 66 to 67. That began in April 2026, and it will finish in March 2028. What I can say about the state pension age is that, as legislated by the previous Government, there is a requirement periodically to review it. The third government review of the state pension age was launched on 21 July last year. It has to be completed by the end of March 2029. Clearly, I cannot pre-empt what will come out there. Its job is to consider a wide range of evidence, including evidence on life expectancy, findings from the Government Actuary on the proportion of adult life spent in retirement and the independent report by Dr Suzy Morrissey that I mentioned earlier, as well as other evidence; for example, from the Pensions Commission. The Secretary of State will look at all that evidence and make a decision. For reasons the noble Baroness will know very well as a former Secretary of State having been in that kind of position, he will wait until he has all that evidence and make a decision.