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Pensioner Poverty

I think that my hon. Friend is calling for the Pensions Act 2008, which we have already implemented and which provides for automatic savings. Several hon. Members have talked about the importance of the default retirement age, the introduction of which in 2006 was a significant step forward. For the first time, it meant that people had the right to remain in work until the age of 65. Proposals to raise or abolish the default retirement age will clearly need consensus between employers and employees for it to work properly. It is not the sort of thing on which we can change our minds, rewriting legislation every couple of years. That is why we are reviewing the matter. Many Members spoke about the importance of take-up, and asked what we were doing to improve it. The significance of take-up can hardly be underestimated. That is why, every week of the year, the Pension, Disability and Carers Service undertakes 13,000 visits to pensioners. Earlier this year, my hon. Friend the Minister for Regional Economic Development and Co-ordination, then a DWP Minister, wrote to nearly 250,000 recipients of pension credit about the passporting of benefits such as council tax benefit. The importance of ensuring that no stigma attaches to people who claim benefits is well understood. That is why, following a campaign by the Royal British Legion, the Government amended the Welfare Reform Bill a few weeks ago—it has now been enacted—to take the power to rename council tax benefit "council tax rebate". Since November 2008, people have to make only one telephone call to claim pension credit, housing benefit and council tax benefit. We have also removed the need for people to give a signature, which was unnecessarily bureaucratic.