{"id":2628,"date":"2015-01-07T16:16:40","date_gmt":"2015-01-07T16:16:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=2628"},"modified":"2015-01-08T15:26:50","modified_gmt":"2015-01-08T15:26:50","slug":"mystery-missing-ukip-pensions-policies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=2628","title":{"rendered":"Mystery of the missing UKIP pensions policies"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>You might not be aware of the exact detail of Labour, the Conservative and the Liberal Democrat parties\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 policies on pensions \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but at least you know they each have them.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Not so the case with UKIP.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>According to Ipsos Mori, 55 per cent of UKIP supporters are aged 55 plus \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the highest of any major party. And yet with just over four months to go until the general election, UKIP has yet to articulate a crucial policy for their core supporters.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>They have a policy on medals for people who have served in the armed forces but not on pensions.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe currently haven&#8217;t announced one,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 UKIP\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Jack Duffin told the <em>Daily Mirror<\/em> (January 7). \u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe&#8217;ll be announcing it at the party conference in Margate in February.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bNo party has released their election manifesto yet,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he added.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>No \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but at least we are aware of where the other parties stand on pensions. Its <a href=\"http:\/\/d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net\/themes\/5308a93901925b5b09000002\/attachments\/original\/1398869254\/EuroManifestoLaunch.pdf?1398869254\">2014 manifesto<\/a>, released ahead of the European Parliamentary Election, also fails to include any pensions details.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Does UKIP \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the party with the oldest voter base \u00e2\u20ac\u201c have any policies on pensions? And if so why leave the details of this crucial voter issue to the last few weeks before an election?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>When <em>Prospect <\/em>magazine asked <a href=\"http:\/\/www.europarl.europa.eu\/meps\/en\/99650\/TIM_AKER_home.html\">Tim Aker, UKIP head of policy and MEP for for the East of England<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.prospectmagazine.co.uk\/opinions\/exclusive-what-will-ukips-election-2015-manifesto-look-like\">in August about public sector pensions<\/a> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c if the party had considered this and what it was planning to do with them, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.prospectmagazine.co.uk\/opinions\/exclusive-what-will-ukips-election-2015-manifesto-look-like\">he said<\/a>, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bI have, and then got very scared and ran away.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>He added, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t looked into it.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Well not recently anyway. Its last pensions proposal was published in 2010 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c five years ago \u00e2\u20ac\u201c by a pensions policy group of members no longer prominent in the party.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The proposals do not look too enticing. To summarise:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>UKIP would roll all existing state pensions, pensions credit, the winter fuel allowance into a flat-rate non-means tested, non-contributory and non-taxable \u00e2\u20ac\u015bcitizen\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pension\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 of \u00c2\u0141130 per week for all pensioners aged 65 and over<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>UKIP would\u00c2\u00a0scrap the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/organisations\/pension-protection-fund\">statutory pension protection fund<\/a> and the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nestpensions.org.uk\/schemeweb\/NestWeb\/public\/home\/contents\/homepage.html\">national pensions savings scheme<\/a> because \u00e2\u20ac\u015bthey are costly and counter-productive\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>UKIP would also reduce the annual limit for tax relievable pension contributions to \u00c2\u014110,000 gross and reinstate the dividend tax credit at 20 per cent.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><em>At least \u00c2\u014118 a week worse off<\/em><\/h3>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>So if these proposals were still to stand, \u00c2\u0141130 a week would leave everyone considerably worse off, with no fuel allowance and \u00c2\u014118.40 a week less than the\u00c2\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/new-state-pension\/overview\">New Pension<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>There are other problematic points. For example, the pension protection fund protects pensioners in case those who provide their private pension go bust. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a key protection that would need to be replaced in some form if UKIP still intends to scrap it.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>UKIP clearly is not in a position to offer itself to the British voting public as a credible political party.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Unite political director, Jennie Formby, said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe UK pensions system has undergone radical change over the last five years and UKIP cannot seriously expect to get away with silence on such a crucial issue for voters \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or to use proposals that are impractical, outdated and would make life even harder for vulnerable pensioners.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIf UKIP cannot even come up with any realistic and credible policies on the issue that concerns the majority of their voters, how can they be considered as a serious political party, responsible for the welfare and future of Britain?\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she asked.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; You might not be aware of the exact detail of Labour, the Conservative and the Liberal Democrat parties\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 policies on pensions \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but at least you know they each have them. &nbsp; Not so the case with UKIP. &nbsp; According to Ipsos Mori, 55 per cent of UKIP supporters are aged 55 plus \u00e2\u20ac\u201c [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[203,154],"wps_subtitle":"UKIP silent on policies affecting majority of its supporters ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2628"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2628"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2628\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2632,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2628\/revisions\/2632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}