REACTION:THE NATIONAL Pensions Framework was described as a "massive gift to the pensions industry" by Fine Gael's social and family affairs spokeswoman Olwyn Enright.
Ms Enright said she had expected radical reforms but “got a set of proposals that will delight the pension companies and their army of marketing staff, actuaries and accountants”.
The proposals would leave most private-sector employees feeling very worried about their future, she said. “The Government is forcing private sector workers into defined-contribution schemes where the individual is expected to carry the entire risk of poor investment returns. This is a scary prospect, considering how badly investments have performed over the past year.”
Labour’s social and family affairs spokeswoman Róisín Shortall described the National Pensions Framework as a “mixed bag”. She said while it contained some positive elements, others would create significant problems.
Referring to the gradual increase in retirement age over the coming decades, she said many people who were fit and well would welcome the opportunity to continue working.
“But for others, those for instance who might have put in 50 years of physical work on building sites, this will be an unwelcome burden,” she said.
The proposed lead-in time for the raising of the retirement age was far too short, she added.
Ms Shortall said it was not entirely clear how the self-employed would fare.
Sinn Féin’s social and family affairs spokesman Aengus Ó Snodaigh said the introduction of mandatory pensions would amount to a further pay cut for low-paid workers.
General secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) David Begg said the proposed new framework fell significantly short in two key areas.
“Firstly, they propose to force people to hand over a portion of their wages to the private pension industry in order to facilitate gambling and stock market speculation. Given that Irish pension funds – and therefore those who manage them – have been the worst-performing in the developed world, this is like a reward for incompetence. The second major failing relates to the absence of any initiative to protect people when a scheme gets into difficulty – a pension protection fund. This is required by law and the workers in SR Technics and Waterford Glass are living proof that it is necessary,” Mr Begg said.
Siptu general president Jack O’Connor described the Government’s pension policy as “worse than expected”.
“Our preliminary analysis suggests that it is no more than an elaborate piece of tokenism which does nothing for the current cohort of citizens approaching pension age whilst simultaneously increasing the qualifying age for the basic State old age pension which PAYE workers have been paying for throughout their working lives,” said Mr O’Connor.