§ Mr. Tim Smithasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what would be the cost of reducing the retirement age for men from 65 years to 60 years and how many men would be affected.
§ Mr. OrmeThis would depend on the extent to which men took advantage of the reduction in pension age and retired earlier. But, on the assumption that the pattern of retirement of men between 60 and 64 would be the same as the existing pattern of retirement of men between 65 and 70, the additional long-term cost to public funds of reducing men's pension age to 60 is estimated to be of the order of £2,500 million a year. If men's pension age were reduced to 60, an estimated 1,360,000 additional men would be of pension age.