Rubbish Pensions, Ovaltine, and The Benefits of Old Age

'You'll probably start receiving your pension when you reach the age of 114'

ONCE upon a time, at the age of 65; you retired with a gold watch, a carriage clock, or a signature plate to remind you of all those years you paid into the state's pocket. You spent your pension on cruises or potting plants or model ships and when you weren't doing that you went looking around Marks and Spencer's for 'sensible shoes'.

Then, sometime later, you ascended on your Stannah stair lift to Heaven; your money going to your family - if they came to visit you - or the local sanctuary for cats with one eye and three legs if they didn't.

But now, things are different. Firstly, you'd be lucky if you can live on a state pension. You've reached the age of 65 and you were hoping to sit down with a cup of Ovaltine and catch up with This Morning, which you've missed for the last 20 years.

You may have been deciding to collect a few tea towels and book a few holidays to places you've always dreamed of going.

But, by the time you realise how much money you're going to get (just 17% of your average lifetime earnings) you find you have to go back to work or sit at home with cold toes because you can't afford to turn the central heating on and you play with a lose thread on your jumper because you can't afford the electricity bill to watch This Morning anyway.

Britain has the worst pension system in Europe. Across the EU, the average pension is a return of 57% of your lifetime's savings. In Britain, just 17% of your average life's savings is what you can expect to get back. Frieda and John Pierre across Europe are on the high seas with their yacht, gold medallions and £1million healthcare insurance while Ethel and Walter in the UK make-do with their £10 Christmas bonus and are praying the NHS can keep their limbs attached.

And it will probably get worse.

The chances are, with pensioners living forever and the retired population continuing to rise, further changes are probably going to be made.

In the future, after spending your whole life paying taxes to ensure our politicians can enjoy the view of a post-Woolworths apocalyptic landscape from the comfort of their £40,000 cars, you'll probably start receiving your pension when you reach the age of 114. And you'll only get it if you were born on the 3rd Wednesday of a month. In the summer. Of a leap year. Under a full moon.

But, being old and retired is not all that bad. Many pensioners out there are not going to let a rubbish pension ruin their retirement.

It's not all about death and boredom.

When you reach the age when you can live without sex but not without your glasses and people call you at 8pm and say "Did I wake you?", there are those who will like to spend their money on wholesale teabags and copious amounts of menthol products.

But there are just as many who give two fingers to the pension system and the state, and spend their hours surfing the internet, kickboxing and break dancing.

And there are still many positives to being old.

Your joints are more accurate at gauging the weather than the Met Office, all your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them, it's now socially acceptable to sing along to music in shopping centres, you think comparing operation scars is entertainment, you can go to eat dinner at 3pm without people thinking you're strange, you can start to wear those clothes you think have come back in, but never actually were, in fashion, you can have a party without the neighbours even realising, and you'll always be the first released from a hostage situation.