DAILY MAIL COMMENT: The perils of yet another Labour pension raid By Daily Mail Comment Published: 19:30 EDT, 23 October 2024 | Updated: 19:50 EDT, 23 October 2024 e-mail View comments In Gordon Brown's first Budget as Chancellor in 1997 he announced a raid on pensions that had devastating consequences. Scrapping the tax relief pension funds received on share dividends set off a chain of events that, over the next two decades, killed off nearly all the generous final salary schemes in the private sector. Today, those generous 'gold-plated' schemes of old are almost the sole preserve of workers in the public sector.
History may be about to repeat itself. Next week, 27 years on from Mr Brown's colossal mistake, a new Labour Chancellor is once again expected to treat private pensions like a cash cow. If, as feared, Rachel Reeves orders firms to pay national insurance on the contributions they make to pensions for staff, the impact may be just as crippling.
If, as feared, Rachel Reeves orders firms to pay national insurance on the contributions they make to pensions for staff, the impact may be just as crippling At a stroke, Ms Reeves will make it vastly more expensive for firms to fund the 'defined contribution' company retirement plans that replaced final salary schemes after 1997. Bosses will inevitably seek to cover their additional costs by holding back on pay rises to staff, cutting jobs or investment – or, more likely, simply reducing the generosity of the pensions they .