THE UK STATE PENSION - A THREAD You must have known this was on its way .... and here it is! Please spare a second to retweet and add any comments 🙏 1/6

This is the time of year when the Peak District gifts us the most perfect mornings - the sun rising on green hills and ribbons of mist in the valleys, clearing slowly as the day dawns, revealing little scenes as it retreats. I stood for a long time watching the colours glow in the early light as the villages woke up. 📍 Peak District, England

It’s that time of year when I join other football supporters in raising money for Prostate Cancer UK. I'm taking on Prostate United 2026 - a 5k run every day during October. Support appreciated. Boing boing! prostateunited.prostatecance…

Today’s the day. Running 50km before I turn 50, in the @UltraChallenges Chilterns 50km in support of @thernohcharity Raising awareness of scoliosis and spinal fusion surgery and money to help them support other children who are recovering from their surgery justgiving.com/page/davidhea…

We're all just one wage slip away or one bad accident away from having to claim unemployment or disability benefits. The common theme among people championing cutting benefits is the thought that they'll never need them. "It's fine because it doesn't affect me" ...

You keep saying this and people keep pointing out that this is wrong and yet you keep saying it. Credits not contributions - important distinction because you don’t have to have paid any NI; no contributions are required and the implication that everyone has paid is incorrect

This "the state pension has been paid for" line has to stop. People QUALIFY for a future state pension by either paying NI from salary, buying years or claiming NI Credits for childcare, caring responsibilities, sickness, disability, unemployment. PAYING NI IS NOT A REQUIREMENT.

RT @LuxMeaMundiAM: Helen Whately is a millionaire. She also claims the most than other MPs. Including £39k a rent paid for by us. Her bills…

Baroness Benefits here is a millionaire on ~£144k a year, but taxpayers cover her rent, energy, water bills, internet everything! She even tried to pay for her holiday flights with public cash. Yet she wants to cut benefits for sick and disabled people living on £7k–£11k a year.

“I see quite clearly that all good things must come to an end. The summer has been splendid, but it has lasted long enough. This morning I welcomed the chill in the air and viewed the falling leaves with cheerfulness.” ~A.A.Milne #Autumn #AutumnEquinox 🍁

When you pay income tax your mindset changes. You are bothered by how it’s spent. You understand how it disincentivises working when you approach a threshold. You realise loads of important aspects of the system. Your mindset becomes based on which taxation methods produce more overall taxation ie growth. Whilst allowing people to keep more of their earnings. If you pay no tax but just receive, receive, receive, your mindset becomes - which party will give me more… Tax the rich (anyone wealthier than me) etc. We are in a position in the U.K. where nearly 50% of the working age population receive more from taxation than they pay in and people still want more, more, more. That just breeds disaster.

I actually don’t agree with raising the tax free personal allowance. Unless everyone (except the really needy) pay some tax then people become entitled and just want more and more ‘free’ stuff. When people pay no tax they lose a sense of caring about how it’s spent. They just start to demand that more and more is paid by others to sustain them and don’t care if the systems are really inefficient and wasteful.

RT @areyoflight: Fact: many people are on UC because they don’t get paid enough from their job to live on. Why aren’t we discussing this,…

1. Auto enrolment is a success 👍 2. People aren't saving enough 👎 3. Don't miss out on "free" money 💰 (employer matching contribution) and save more than the minimum, if you can 4. Watch your pension pot grow 🤞 Sounds simple but we know it's not - particularly affordability.

Lovely dawn sky. Outside 1830s built Cathedral Mansions in Huskisson Street, Liverpool.

It's been good, but I think it's now time to end. Pensioner poverty is now lower than any other group. And the money spent increasing every pensioners state pension by triple lock could be better spent focussing help on those pensioners who are still in poverty. When children are in poverty no one suggests increasing the benefits of wealthy parents too as the best way of helping children in poverty. Let's remember the current pensioners who benefit from triple lock, weren't so generous to their parents. The whole reason the triple lock was needed was becuase state pensions had fallen to a lower % of average earnings. And it's current pensioners who benefitted by not having to pay the higher taxes that would've been needed to increase those past pensions.

Breaking the triple lock does not mean the state pension won't increase. It will. As for doubling it - it's not meant to provide for a luxury retirement. If people want that, we have to save into private pensions which have been available for decades + generous tax subsidies.