Welcome to the Centre for Retirement Reform

The CRR was established in 2009 as a think tank and lobbying body set up to help bring about the reform necessary to produce better retirement outcomes for the people of Britain. Although the pensions arena continues to go through change and restructuring, to date this has fallen well short of the root and branch reform required to address the biggest issues affecting retirement now and into the future.

When the CRR was established, it believed that three fundamental changes were necessary:

1. State retirement age needs to be raised to 70 as soon as practicable; sensible transitional arrangements are perfectly possible.
   
2. The existing state pension benefits system should be replaced with a simple, universal state pension at or above the current means tested level – a change that can be self-funding.
3. A new long term savings product structure must be developed to replace the current private pension model as it is no longer fit for purpose.

The Coalition Govenrment established in 2010 set about addressing the first two objectives and is currently consulting on both these issues with the intention of bringing about fundamental changes in the next few years. In addition to the third objective above, we have added two additional objectives:

1. To facilitate positive public attitudes to longer working lives, flexible retirement concepts and saving for retirement.
2. To support the implementation of a policy framework for a flexible retirement which is simple, fair, affordable and meaningful.

These crucial changes are the essential steps required in a holistic programme of reform; work which will also address the challenges of an older workforce, healthy ageing, long term care and improving longevity.

The CRR will carry out a programme of research, stakeholder engagement and lobbying to champion this fundamental rethink and overhaul of the UK retirement scene. We invite all like-minded people and organisations to join us in this vital campaign.

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