The Liberal Democrats' manifesto will commit the party to passing the triple lock state pension guarantee into law, pensions minister Steve Webb announced this weekend.
30 JUNE 2014 | BY JUDITH UGWUMADU
Webb said the triple lock guarantee would give pensioners more certainty that their pension will continue to rise in future.
The so-called triple lock, introduced in 2010, ensures an annual rise in the value of the state pension, by whichever is the higher of annual earnings growth, inflation or 2.5%. They would take the value of the basic state pension to around £131 a week by from its current level of £113.10 per week.
Webb blamed successive Labour and Conservative governments for allowing the state pension to decline after Margret Thatcher broke the earnings link in 1980. He claimed that a decent income in retirement for pensioners was central to the Liberal Democrat 'vision of a fair society'.
'Our manifesto promise of a "triple lock" has been implemented every year since 2010 and means that the state pension is already a higher share of the national average wage than at any time since the early 1990s,' he said.
'But if we are serious about having a decent state pension we need to go further. That is why the Liberal Democrats will guarantee in law that in each year pensions will rise by the highest of wages, prices or 2.5%.'