Don't Spin the Pensioners!

October 2004

The Independent newspaper described Tory leader, Michael Howard’s conference speech two weeks ago as spin even “when he proclaimed a lack of spin.” And no wonder - just take their policies for pensioners.

The state pension for a couple would be £2381 more today, if the Conservative hadn’t broken the link with earnings but they now claim to be in favour of restoring the link. This is though just spin. Firstly this will only come at the end of Parliament, four years after a general election. And secondly even on the Tories’ own figures, there is a £180 million funding gap – no wonder the Tory shadow chancellor told the Times newspaper that the policy was not fully-costed.policies for pensioners.

In contrast the Lib Dems have been honest. We have said we will increase the pension immediately by £108 a month (or £143 for couples) for all over-75s, the poorest group of pensioners - taking a million pensioners out of demeaning means testing. And we will work to extend that to all pensioners. policies for pensioners.

We would also abolish the council tax and replace it with a local income tax based on the ability to pay – lifting two-thirds of pensioners out of paying local taxes and saving many more hundreds of pounds a year. But Michael Howard himself told the Bournemouth Echo, there was not much wrong with the council tax. policies for pensioners.

We would also deal with another key concern of pensioners – free personal care if they have to go into residential care. And we would give pensioners and disabled people free off-peak local bus passes. policies for pensioners.

It’s a well-thought out package and our promises have been fully-costed and the figures can be inspected on our national website.

Just months from an election, the Conservatives policies either don’t add up or they can’t say where they stand. Their position was perhaps most accurately summed up by David Curry, a Tory MP who wrote in the Financial Times in a rare outbreak of honesty that the party had not “decided what sort of party it is” and it had “not established that it is not the same old party so comprehensively pitched out of office in 1997.”