SOUTH West Bedfordshire MP Andrew Selous has welcomed the biggest ever cash rise in the Basic State Pension coming into effect this month.
The Government’s new ‘triple lock’ guarantee on the Basic State Pension ensures it rises every year with inflation, earnings or 2.5 per cent – whichever is the highest. This week, it will rise by £5.30 a week or £275 a year. As a result of the triple lock, pensioners will be an average of £15,000 better off over the course of their retirement.
This comes on top of the Government’s decision to protect pensioner benefits – winter fuel payments, free prescriptions and eye tests, free bus travel and free TV licences for older the over 75s – as it deals with the record budget deficit and debt inherited from Labour.
Mr Selous MP said: “Thanks to the Conservatives in government, 18,800 pensioners people in South West Bedfordshire will take home, the largest ever increase in the state pension, an extra £5.30 a week from this month.
“For 13 years, Labour promised to restore the link between earnings and the State Pension, but did nothing. This resulted in older people getting paltry pension increases – as little as 75 pence one year.
“But the Conservatives in government have reformed the State Pension, introducing the triple lock, which ensures that pensions always rise by the greatest of inflation, earnings or 2.5 per cent. This will benefit pensioners by an average of £15,000 over their retirement.”