Introduction

Labour's 1979 Election Manifesto reiterated the party's long-standing objective of achieving a state pension of one third adult average earnings for single people and half average earnings for couples. However, in 1981 the Conservative government broke the link between pensions and earnings, and the basic state pension (BSP) became indexed to prices. Restoring the link to earnings became a central plank of Labour policy in opposition. Both the 1987 and 1992 Manifestos promised to increase the pension by an extra £5.00 per week for a single person and £8.00 per week for a married couple as a first step. The 1997 Manifesto, however, marked a paradigm shift, with the restoration of the BSP's level noticeable by its absence. The Manifesto still argued that “all pensioners should share fairly in the increasing prosperity of the nation” but proposed “a partnership between public and private provision, and a balance between income sourced from tax and invested savings” (Labour Party, 1997, pp 26-7). Beyond a statement that they would “examine means of delivering more automatic help to the poorest pensioners”, there was no explicit target to reduce pensioner poverty, although there was a promise to “set up a review of the central areas of insecurity for elderly” (Labour Party, 1997, p 27).

Fulfilling this promise, within a year systematic reviews of both pensions and long-term care provision had been established, leading to the Green Paper Partnership in pensions (DSS, 1998) and the report of the Royal Commission on Long Term Care (Sutherland, 1999). These were followed by the publication of Opportunity for all (OFA) (DSS, 1999), the blueprint of the government's approach to poverty and social exclusion (see Chapter One of this volume). In this, New Labour's three key priorities for older people are:

• • tackling the problems of low income and social exclusion among today's pensioners;

• • improving opportunities for older people to live secure, fulfilling and active lives; and

• • ensuring that more of tomorrow's pensioners can retire on a decent income.

Taking each of these in turn, this chapter examines the policy changes introduced to achieve these goals and assesses the success of these policies in terms of measurable outcomes, using both the government's own monitoring data and other sources.