State pensioners aged 80 and over receive an addition of 25 pence to their state pension. The age addition was introduced in 1971, in recognition of “the special claims of very elderly people who on the whole need help rather more than others”.
It has never been uprated, with successive Governments either arguing that greater priority should be given to protecting the level of the basic benefits, or choosing to target additional resources at older pensioners by other means, for example, through means-tested benefits or lump sum payments, such as the Winter Fuel Payment.
Radio Times reader Delia emailed BBC Money Box journalist Paul Lewis and said: “I turned 80 at the end of September last year and received an age-related rise to my pension of 25p per week. This is an insult. I’m writing to you to let off steam.”
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Mr Lewis explained: “Everyone on the state pension receives this “birthday present” of an extra 25p a week when they reach 80 – but it’s now worth so little you’d need to save it up for three weeks to buy a second-class stamp!
“(In 1971, when the addition was introduced, the state pension was only £6 a week. So 25p, while not generous, was the equivalent today of £6.50 on top of the current basic pension of £156.20 a week.)
“Delia thinks it would be better to scrap what she calls “this paltry sum”. But it costs around £47 million a year to give it to the 3.6 million state pensioners over 80, and I can see the headlines now if the Government tried to take it away!
“However, I don’t imagine they’ll be raising it to £6.50 either (at a cost of over £1 billion a year).
“Not least because it’s a problem that will eventually go away: the 25p addition will not be paid with the new state pension when the first people who get that reach 80.”