NPC guest speakers at the ARMS meeting

The NPC banner at the TUC's "For A 

Future That Works" march in 2012

At the ARMS Merseyside all-members meeting earlier today, we had guest speakers from the National Pensioners Convention (NPC) and the Merseyside Pensioners Association (MPA). Marie Harrison of the NPC reminded us that the organisation was set up by Jack Jones, former TGWU General Secretary. It is an umbrella organisation open to affiliation by any organisation representing older people that wants a voice. The MPA is an affiliated group.

Campaigns include:

• Decent pensions, i.e. a minimum of £175.
• Protecting concessionary travel rights, the winter fuel payments and over-75 free TV licences.

The NPA lobbies Parliament when appropriate and holds the National Pensioners Parliament every year in Blackpool (Tony Mulhearn's report on this year's is here), and produces material on an increasingly complicated pensions situation. Other publications cover issues such as pensions and social care, and they also publish a monthly campaign bulletin.

She spoke about National Dignity Day, which highlights the Dignity Code for people in care and in the NHS. They aim to have it adopted by local authorities, but its implementation is patchy.

The Tory government has a cavalier attitude to pensions, such as "liberating" pension pots, but in reality the younger generation will have to work longer and pay more for lower benefits. The government and media propaganda about affluent pensioners hides the reality that 40% of pensioners have experienced poverty within the last 12 months, such as struggling to pay for food or fuel.

May from the MPA explained that her group is a campaigning group, taking their banner to picket lines, lobbying MPs, and acting as an exchange of information among its members. The concerns of the MPA go beyond pensioners to include working people and future generations: it is not just a retired person's tea-drinking social group. They meet every Wednesday at 1.30pm in Jack Jones House. We were told that the MPA is the best organised and best attended group in the Britain, and it meets the most frequently. We were also told that meetings can sometimes get quite heated.

The meeting thanked our guest speakers and passed the NPC's model motion for transmission upwards within PCS.