People hardly need me to tell them how tough things are at the moment. Wages are flat, taxes high, bills keep going up and up.
Recent figures showed the economy didn’t grow at all in January. Rising petrol prices are only going to make things harder.
Meanwhile, we have a Prime Minister and Chancellor whose only solution to this crisis is to convene pointless meetings day after day.
I am all too aware that these are particularly worrying times for pensioners and those approaching retirement.
For 30 or 40 years they’ve paid their National Insurance Contributions and now worry that their reward of a state pension is going to be swiped from under them.
Frankly, it’s not hard to see why.
They see a country overladen with debt and a Labour government still borrowing like there’s no tomorrow, just as the Conservatives did.
They see a government possibly soon to be led by Angela Rayner or, God forbid, Ed Miliband, and they think it can only be a matter of time before these spendthrift socialists start coming for their nest egg.
People hardly need me to tell them how tough things are at the moment. Wages are flat, taxes high, bills keep going up and up, writes Nigel Farage
That’s why, here and now, I will promise to protect the triple lock.
Under a Reform UK government your state pension will always go up each year in line with inflation, wage increases or by 2.5 per cent – whichever is the highest.
Critics, of course, will wring their hands about affordability. They say it’s too expensive and unsustainable. But what they really mean is that they would rather break a promise to pensioners than make tough decisions elsewhere.
I take a different view. If we are serious about funding the triple lock, we must be equally serious about getting our priorities straight. That starts with cutting waste. Take a look around and you will see there is plenty of it.
Just look at what we spend on migrant accommodation – £15billion in the past decade. That’s right. Millions of pounds are spent each day just to house people who broke into the country illegally.
Since 2010, £200billion of taxpayers’ money has been frittered away on foreign aid, often to wealthy countries. In this Parliament alone, it’s estimated £59billion will be spent on pointless net-zero schemes.
And do we really need 120,000 more civil servants than we had in 2015?
Reform UK is also going to take a long, hard look at defined benefit pension schemes in the public sector. These gold-plated schemes were phased out in the private sector years ago and now represent the Government’s second-largest financial liability.
I don’t think they should be accepting new entrants.
On top of all that, over the next few weeks we plan to announce the biggest cuts to the benefits bill in history.
So let me be clear: This is about priorities. We can afford the triple lock if we choose to.
Britain made a promise to its pensioners. And I, for one, intend to keep it.
