Ministers face demands to scrap the retirement age after research showed that most people think fixed retirement ages are outdated and workers should be able to choose when they stop working.

Stakeholder Response: Help the Aged

A spokesman for Help the Aged said: "Help the Aged vigorously opposes any introduction of a normal  retirement  age.

"The debate about working longer (which many people are now recognising as an inevitable corollary to rising longevity) remains very confused.

"There is no retirement age in the UK. Both the state and private pension providers define pension ages - it is essential to the arithmetic of calculating pension values that there is a fixed point in the calculation.

"But this does not need to be the age at which people retire, and nor should it.   People should be free to choose the date or their retirement to suit their own circumstances."

Stakeholder Response: Association of Retired and Persons Over 50

Don Steele, social policy director of the Association of Retired and Persons Over 50 said: "Much of the present discussion on 'scrapping the retirement age' is entirely missing the point.

"The fact is the UK has never had a legal retirement age, only one arbitrarily imposed by employers. What the CBI and others now want the government to do is to introduce a compulsory retirement age when European employment legislation is enacted in 2006. Too often 'retirement age' is confused with State pension age, which the government has clearly stated, will not change.

"What we now need is not abandonment of the current position, where, given
employer agreement, people can work as long as they wish, but an enhancement
of the provision and encouragement of older people to stay in the workplace
as long as they wish and are competent to do the job. In fact, competence
must be the only criterion for judging whether someone should be employed or
not.

"The government must not give in to pressure from employers which would place
unprecedented legal restriction on the right to work. On the contrary, complete freedom in the workplace can bring nothing but benefit to all concerned".

Stakeholder Response: Age Concern

Gordon Lishman, Age Concern's director general, said: "The government must stick to its guns and not compromise. This decision will be a litmus test of how ready the government is to deal with an ageing population and whether it is serious about giving older people the right to choose, not lose, work."

Stakeholder Response: Institute of Directors

Richard Wilson, head of business policy at the Institute of Directors, said: "In a survey of IoD members in 2003, a slightly larger proportion of members believed that an employer should only be able to force an employee to retire if he/she was no longer capable of doing their job, in comparison to those members who supported a default retirement age.
 
"It seems generally accepted that people are going to need to work longer in order to save more for their retirement. It follows from this that we need to maximise opportunities for work.
 
"The crucial issue for business is being able to maintain a productive and efficient workforce. If the government does abolish the default retirement age, it must enable employers to dismiss employees who are no longer proficient at carrying out their work."

Stakeholder Response: Counsel and Care

Martin Green, cheif executive of Counsel and Care said: “ It is certainly time that we scraped the retirement age and recognized that we need the skills and experience of older people in the work force. This sort of ageism can not be allowed in the 21st century. It is unjust and economically damaging to the economy."