The Triple Lock is under increasing attack with strident demands for older people to stop destroying the future for young people.

Beveridge's National insurance plan was intended as a means of guaranteeing subsistence. He envisioned a twenty-year phased introduction and was totally opposed to a system based on tax. He stated that the Employers contribution should be counted as an additional wage, not a tax on employment. Old age pensions were to be conditional on retirement from work, with provision for an increase in the number of benefits for each year of postponed retirement. Beveridge believed that people should work as long as they could. A flexible age of retirement, he claimed, gave satisfaction to the individual and benefited the community by increasing wealth and happiness.

The report was popular, but not with the Fabian society, which meant the vast majority of Labour's future government. Beatrice Webb explained, "This plan is founded on the wrong principle. It is an attempt to make the worker more secure under capitalism; and that can only result in an even worse catastrophe…. It is an attempt to cure the evils of Capitalism without getting rid of the causes". She went on to note that Beveridge had told the Fabian Society he was against any form of Soviet Communism. "But surely" she wrote, "the only real solution to our problems is going to be planned production for commodity consumption, which is what the Russians have". The Russian model, was, she claimed, the answer. Atlee agreed and in 1945 introduced the NHS based on the Soviet model, not as Bevan claimed on the Tredegar Medical Aid Society which was a contributory scheme.

National Insurance (NI) contributions have never been used to fund the NHS or provide health insurance. According to the government NI is a contributory insurance scheme providing the following benefits:

  • Basic State Pension, Additional State Pension, New State Pension. These are paid from retirement to death.
  • Contribution-based Employment and Support Allowance for those with health conditions that prevent them working.

The following are time limited:

  • New Style Jobseeker's Allowance up to six months.
  • Maternity Allowance 39 weeks
  • Bereavement Support Payment. Maximum: a one-off payment of £3,500 18 monthly payments of £350 Minimum: a one-off payment of £2,500 18 monthly payments of £100. There are a number of restrictions including that the claimant must be under state retirement age. (This excludes pensioners who are the most likely to need it)

Unlike any other insurance, NI is not collected until a wage threshold is reached. Currently that is £242 per week (£12,584 pa) The new minimum wage, assuming a 40 hour week and holiday entitlement is £26,436.80 for those 21 and over. £22,568.00 for those between 18 and 21 and £16,640.00 for those under 18 .

Above the threshold the employee pays 8% and the employer 15% a total of 25%. Private pension providers suggest that 15% of a persons salary is enough to provide a pension. If NI were levied on total earnings the rate could be reduced for both employee and employer. Apart from the state pension the other insured risks are small and limited.

Beveridge wanted a phased introduction taking twenty years, another recommendation ignored, That could have been corrected by the 1951 Conservative government. Unfortunately, Butler and Macmillan were as wedded to socialism as the Labour party and the opportunity was missed. Because of that NI has been treated as an extra tax income. If a private scheme had done that the managers would be in goal. The claim that it was always intended for each generation to pay for the one preceding it, is not true.

Rather than punish those who have worked, paid and suffered the consequences of misplaced trust there are ways this situation could be corrected.

These are:

  • Reduce the rates but apply payment to the whole wage.
  • Stop tax funded gold plated pensions for government employees.
  • Stop the mental health industry giving lazy people an excuse to sponge.
  • Drill, Frack and become self sufficient in energy. Use a proportion of tax on that bonanza to create a Sovereign NI fund.
  • Use the unused Brexit dividend to create Singapore on Thames and use the wealth that creates to add to the NI fund.
  • As investments returns grow reduce the tax amount required to correct past mistakes.

It is simple and appealing to attack older people as a drain on society overlooking their contribution. It also overlooks a simple fact,. Pensioners are young people who have lived to collect on the promise they paid for. One day those clamouring for a cut in pensioner benefits will, I hope, reach that milestone too. They need to think of solutions, not excuses for past Malfeasance.