Changes to State pension age for women

Actually Hephaestus, I do agree that there was abuse of the early retirement through ill health in the past.   But the point some of us are trying to make is that these pension funds have seen dramatic changes,  to the detriment of their members, in the space of a very short time.  And I don't think we are at the end yet. I think that only genuine cases for early retirement get though now (I hope).    The career averaging will see even the best paid public sector workers having to settle for well below the half pension they can achieve at the moment.   The other big point I am trying to make is that very few actually get the full number of required years in, and therefore have neither a huge pension, nor a huge tax free pay out.    If you don't believe us when we tell you that public sector workers do not get 2/3rds salary, then look it up.   It is not secret.  All of the major pension funds have details for all to view, including the NHS and TPs, which between them must count for the majority of public sector workers.   

Also to be added into the mix, is that with the new flat pension, all of those public workers who have been opted out, will not get the full, new pension.   Something which is going to come as a shock to a lot of them. 

Roly2,

Isn't adding the tax free lump sum to a public sector equivelant to a two thirds of final salary pension? In the private sector the member can take a reduced pension by opting to commute a tax free lump sum, why is this classed as part of the member's pension benefits for private sector annuitants as against something totally unconnected in the public sector?

I just wish people slagging off public sector pensions knew what they were talking about, not listening to hearsay or making it up because someone knows someone on a pension.

Yes, as pointed out by others on here, public sector pensions used to be very good, as did private pensions, until the raid on pensions by Brown and the crash caused by deregulation of Banking when we followed the USofA model.  All pensions suffered, some in the private sector eg equitable life disapeared.  Public sector acted to make sure the disparity between public and private was not so big, and so unaffordable.

All the public sector professions mentioned on here have different pension arrangements to each other and can't be put into one 'public sector' bag.  There is no 'lump sum' for everyone entitled to a public sector pension.  There is for some pension schemes and not for others.  Similarly, whether a pension entitlement is 1/80, 1/60th of a salary, a career average or something else, it completely depends on which 'public' pension scheme an individual's public sector employer has.

As in the private sector, those who earn more in public sector pay more (usually) into their pension.  They may get the headline pensions used by the media to slam generic 'public pension'.  The majority of workers (look it up) don't get anywhere near those 'gold plated' pensions and they are the ones we rely on to give us our services, whether nurses, teachers, firemen, police etc.  Please stop the bashing.

So discussing the mathematics of public sector pensions is 'slagging off' and 'public sector bashing', fair enough jane, but please expand on your 'no lump sum' claim, because I know this to be wrong.  

Respectfully, re-read my post.  All schemes are different. Some with lump some availability were closed to new entrants a long time ago.  Those with that entitlement are much fewer than they were and many retiring now will not have that availability.