Scrap the compulsory retirement age

For many, retirement is a dream they pursue with zest when they reach middle age. Fantasies of long days lazing about in the garden, or spending more time doting on their grandchildren, or practising their favourite pastime, kill the pain and drudgery of everyday working life.

Yet, for many others retirement is a nightmare, or rather becomes a nightmare when they suddenly wake up in the morning a few weeks after retiring and realise that they are rotting mentally. They soon acknowledge that their long sought leisure activities no longer provide them with the intellectual stimulus that was such an important part of their lives when they were working.

In the UK a recent important court ruling is adding pressure on the government to scrap the retirement age of 65 for those who would like to continue in employment. Mr Justice Blake rejected a challenge to the compulsory retirement age by charities for the elderly on the basis that when it was introduced it was justified.

However, he went on to say: "I cannot presently see how 65 could remain as a default retirement age." Economic and social issues make this statement very important.

It is a well-known fact that many workers, especially men, suffer a serious deterioration in their health just a few months after they retire. These people were hard-wired to work for eight or more hours a day for four decades or more, only to find themselves idle when they still enjoy good health and are motivated to continue working.

Some find this reality rather amusing and poke fun at those "who do not have a life outside work". This is a cruel oversimplification of reality. In today's social and economic realities many healthy workers who have reached the statutory retirement age may still want, and need, to continue working to support their families financially and to preserve their mental well-being.

These people should be given a chance to continue working, if they decide to do so. It should no longer be left to the employer to decide whether to keep them on or not. Of course, if there are valid disciplinary reasons to refuse such a right to any individual, then it is understandable that exceptions to this principle may be allowed. The government should set an example by scrapping the compulsory retirement age for its employees.

Equally important, private employers should never resort to the strategic harassment of workers by hounding them out of their jobs through early retirement schemes that are only nominally voluntary. Such schemes are often not really needed to restructure the business and only serve to dump workers in a human scrap heap. This is sadism at its worst.

In the current difficult economic situation there are thousands of families that face a drastic deterioration in their lifestyle because they can no longer live well with the pensions they are entitled to. For such families, continuing to work could make the difference between existing in a virtual state of poverty or keeping their standard of living, while still contributing to the economic wellbeing of the country.

In many countries where the right to continue working has been in place for some years, it has been found that this practice does not, in fact, limit job opportunities for the younger generations who are knocking at the door of employers for their first job. The experience of older workers can be channelled to provide training to new workers especially in those enterprises where training is not a permanent feature of their business life.

Raising the retirement age to 65, and possibly to 68 in a few years time, may become inevitable to make our pensions systems more viable than it is at present. It, therefore, makes sense that those who even now opt to continue working should be given the chance to do so.

Many are rightly considering the current legislation that leaves it up to the employer to decide whether to extend the retirement age of those who want to continue working, as unfair and well past its sell-by date.

May the change in this legislation be one of the pleasant surprises in the next budget.

johncassarwhite@yahoo.com