National Audit Office Press Releases
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Government Interventions to Support Future Retirement Incomes

Government measures to reduce the liability of the state for supporting people in their retirement are being managed separately, without adequate consideration of their combined impact on the overall objective of increasing retirement incomes. According to a report today by the National Audit Office, there is no overarching programme or single accountability for encouraging people to save for retirement.

The Treasury leads on overall savings strategy, and DWP on workplace saving but, without a whole system view, the NAO believes there is a risk that individual, but co-dependent interventions may not be effective in increasing saving for retirement.

The recent report highlights the significant consequences for the taxpayer as people live longer and spend longer in retirement and have increasing social and healthcare needs. Spending on the state pension and pensioner benefits increased from 5.5 per cent of GDP in 1990 to 6.9 per cent in 2011-12, in part because of the growing pensioner population, but also because of increased spending per capita on pensioner benefits. The Government expects to reduce the potential long-term spending liability by increasing the future state pension age, introducing automatic enrolment into workplace pensions and changing the state pension.

Full report: Government Interventions to Support Future Retirement Incomes

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