The Conservative Party leader, Kemi Badenoch, has confirmed her commitment to keeping the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) state pension triple lock, a week after Labour leader Andy Burnham said he would adjust the pledge from 2030. In an interview with the BBC on Sunday morning, Ms Badenoch stated that the rising costs of the triple lock would not be a problem if the economy were growing more quickly.
Badenoch defends triple lock as economy struggles
Ms Badenoch acknowledged that there were “good people” on both sides of the argument about keeping or changing the triple lock, but she affirmed her commitment to it. She said: "The reason why is because what is going wrong in our economy is not lots of elderly people earning £10,000, £12,000 a year on the state pension. It is the huge number of people who can work, who don’t work."
The Conservative Party leader added: "We’ve had different policies at different times. We go with what the leader does. I am the leader now and what I am saying is that our economy is not growing. Changing and moving around the triple lock does not create growth. In fact, if we were growing at 2 or 3%, nobody would be talking about the triple lock."
Pension system needs long-term reform, says Badenoch
Ms Badenoch described spending on the pensions triple lock as just “a ledger on the budget line”. She argued that the current system is unsustainable in the long term, saying: "Ultimately I think what we will need in the end is an entirely new pension system. I mean, a baby that is born today has a 20% chance of living to be 100 and I don’t think we can fund one in five people half of their lives, you know, for the first 20 and the last 30 years."
She suggested that any future changes would need to be phased in realistically: "But obviously if you are 90 you probably can’t go out and get a job right, so I think you have to be realistic about how you would taper that and bring that in across the population. I just think the whole system as it stands can’t stand for very much longer."
Conservatives back pensioners' contributions
Ms Badenoch stressed that the triple lock and pensions are things that people have contributed to, and that Conservatives believe those who have contributed deserve to receive their state pension. She said: "What we don’t want to see is people going after the elderly, chasing after vulnerable and disabled people, and then the extremely large cohort of people who can work, who are not working, [being] left alone [ie, not having their benefits cut]."
She concluded: "The triple lock is our policy. We believe that this is the right policy for pensioners. That is what we have planned, that is what we have promised. There is nothing that has happened that has made me change my mind. That is our policy."
