27/03/03

Responding to the Pensions Green Paper, the ABI (Association of British Insurers) has today called for the Government to establish a clear direction for pension policy by setting explicit targets against which success can be measured.

Mary Francis, Director General of the ABI, said:

“We support the voluntarist approach to saving. But the proposals in the Green Paper will not provide today’s workers with decent incomes in retirement.

“Unless we act now to implement radical and fundamental change, we could be back at the drawing board in a few years’ time.

“Britain needs a pensions policy that delivers. The Government needs to set clear and demanding targets, both for reforming the state pension and for increasing voluntary saving, and progress must measured regularly against them. ”

The ABI has recommended that the Government’s own figures be used to set the following targets:

- By 2008 the number of people seriously under-saving must be reduced from 3 million to zero;
- By 2008 the number of people potentially under-saving must be cut by half from 5-10 million; and
- By 2008 75% of employees should receive at least a 5% employer contribution.

The ABI has made a number of radical proposal that have been designed to add to those in the Green Paper and help the Government meet the proposed targets:

Provided by the ABI