Pensions - straw that will break the camel’s back

I breathed a sigh of relief this week as my children returned to school after the interminable excitement and chaos of christmas holidays.

My thoughts quickly turned to my own 3 R’s.cResolutions. Revalidation. Retirement.

Resolutions first then. Easy. Resolved to stick to resolutions this year.

Revalidation. Looks like it might actually be happening soon! The last time I heard this was in 2004 on an ‘introduction to appraisal’ session where the trainer remarked that as my GMC number ended in 2, I would be in the first of a five year cycle. I thanked him and quickly got myself off to a fire safety lecture.

Then it paused and paused, and paused. This was a good thing because it gave both parties on either side of the deal a chance to realise what was required and how it could be achieved. It’s fair to say in the intervening eight years the GMC have met doctors in a reasonably fair middle ground of sensibility and practicality. Appraisals this year will be the first mandatory step of this much pared down revalidation process and I’m happy to comply (but I’ll still be nipping off to Moving and Handling and such like).

So to Retirement. I wrote about this barely six months ago. I remember actively looking forward to this not least of all due to my perceived time of impending wealth. Mortgage paid, kids independent a big lump sum and a great on going pension. A reward reaped from my preceding years of hard toil and payment of dues.

How quickly things can change.

Today is the closing date for the BMA members survey of feelings and attitudes towards the rather snappy title of ‘Pension Tension‘.

Being outwith the 10 (or 13.5) year period of relative safety (albeit with planed increase in contributions) I am more interested than many. I’ve actually read the bumpf before it went into the recycling, I’ve filled in (and returned) the questionnaires, spread the word, and for once I actually feel quite motivated to take some active steps rather than stick with the masses in an apathetic state of resignation.

I’m thinking that for once I may get involved. Try to help the cause. Attend the meetings and vocalise.

So what’s changed? I never felt like this about the New Deal, the EWTD reduction in hours , the new consultant contract. Each of those things, even when not  affecting me for the better, seemed reasonable and for the greater benefit in what is a publicly funded service. Some costs and payments were indeed excessive/unfair/outdated and irrelevant in modern day practice.

Our pension is none of these things.

It is recently overhauled. Fit for purpose. Self-funding.

We are currently being ripped off. Being viewed as a target population traditionally disparate who do very little to oppose changes, we are a soft cohort of higher tax rate payers being used to ease the dire financial state which government  has allowed to develop. Dividing the public sector into higher and lower earners sees our increased contributions as nothing other than a blatant additional super tax on those whom they think will afford it easily enough not to bother. And it’s double ended: take more from us, take it for longer and give us back less in return during our decreasing number of senior years.

This may have been true in the past but things are different now. We are in the midst of a prolonged real and relative pay freeze, increased National Insurance contributions, removal of child benefit and an increased cost of living.

Pension tension will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

What we fear most is not the 2.5% annual increase in contributions this April, nor having an 68-year-old tremulous ophthalmic surgeon with failing faculties operating on our cataracts. It is the fear that a precedent is being set and accepting this will only be the beginning. We are very close to having unilateral changes imposed upon our contracts. If we accept this lying down, the government will be back every few years demanding, or taking, more and more.

Bullying is perpetuated in playgrounds until the victims are brave enough to tell someone about it, to actively do something. The same is true for doctors. We must take action. We must be strong and cohesive. We must try to gain some public support. We must do SOMETHING rather than nothing and stop issuing thinly veiled threats with no substance, which no one believes.

The government means business and so must we.

Tags: Pensions