Briefing Notes

Briefing Note 67 - Freedom and Choice in Pensions: the minimum pension age

At Budget 2014 the Chancellor announced that, from April 2015 onwards, restrictions on accessing private Defined Contribution (DC) savings from age 55 would be removed. Further to this, the Government published a consultation document Freedom and choice in pensions providing details on how these proposals might work in practice. In this consultation document, the Government proposes increasing the age at which individuals can access their private pension saving, known as the minimum pension age, in line with planned increases to State Pension Age (SPA).

This Briefing Note considers the rationale for increasing the minimum pension age in line with the SPA. It then explores the extent to which the current minimum pension age influences saving and retirement behaviour, the differences in minimum pension ages and SPAs between the UK and other countries, and some practical implementation issues that might arise as a result of future increases to the minimum pension age.

PPI held a Supporting Member’s event to discuss HM Treasury’s Budget consultation paper on Freedom and Choice in Pensions, which seeks views on changes to the taxation of DC pension savings and how they are accessed in retirement. To read the event report, please click here. The event and the Briefing Notes mentioned above form part of the PPI's response to the HM Treasury consultation.