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The Employers Forum on Age continues to campaign against enforced retirement
23 September 2008
The Employers Forum on Age continues to campaign against enforced retirement. Following the opinion given today by the Advocate General that the UK retirement regulations do not breach the Framework Directive 2000/78, Catharine Pusey, Director of The Employers Forum on Age comments, “Today’s news leaves us no further forward on the issue of default retirement in the UK. It would be wrong for either side to claim a victory.
“The situation still hinges upon whether the UK Government can objectively justify the inclusion of a default retirement age in the age discrimination legislation. Whilst not binding on the ECJ, this decision indicates that the status quo in the UK may be maintained. This would mean that we rely on the enlightened employers, many of them our members, to promote policies which make no assumptions about people’s employability based on age.
Catharine continues, “It’s not just attitudes to working beyond 65 that need to change. The fiscal reality is that the UK economy can no longer afford a culture of early retirement; many of us will have a third of our lives ahead of us as we collect our first pension cheque. The EFA has been working with a growing number of enlightened employers who have chosen not to use the default age and instead allow employees to retire when it suits them. Far from being a burden, this new flexibility has resulted in significant business benefits; filling skills gaps and keeping valuable members of their workforce.
“Lifestyles have changed, people have children later and at 65 they may still be putting children though university or paying off a mortgage. Flexibility around retirement age is an exciting opportunity. We are not talking about forcing people to work until their dying day but we are talking about giving the individual choice about when they retire. With the right approach we believe that imposed retirement will one day be a distant memory.”
Catharine continues, “As part of our ongoing campaign to urge employers and politicians to take a different approach to retirement, this summer we sent spoof retirement letters (replicating the standard notice of retirement letter that thousands of workers in the UK receive when they reach 65 - regardless of whether they wish to retire or not) to all MPs who were approaching or over 65 years of age to notify them that they would need to retire in nine months time. The letters provoked some MPs to write strong letters of support for our campaign to end the default retirement age. These included David Winnick MP, Frank Cook MP, Austin Mitchell MP and Paul Flynn, MP - who told us that this was an issue regularly raised by their constituents.”
As working lives get longer an important part of the work that The EFA are doing is to ensure that their members understand age legislation in all its intricacies and benefit from having an age diverse workforce. The EFA’s long-term campaign is to persuade the Government to commit to remove the retirement age in 2011 - rather than merely reviewing it. This will provide clarity for employers and employees and give employers several years to prepare.
Catharine concludes, “We firmly believe that it is inevitable that the default retirement age (DRA) will be removed altogether, whatever the final outcome of the Heyday challenge.”
The Employers Forum on Age (EFA) the UK's leading authority on age in the workplace are available for comment and interview.
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For further information please contact:
The Employers Forum on Age
Beth Vaughan: 020 7785 6539 - beth.vaughan@efa.org.uk
Or
Lansons Communications
Helen Thomson: 0207 294 3604 - helent@lansons.com
Notes to Editors
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