We’ve joined the National Pensioners’ Convention

Posted: March 15th, 2013

THE AMP has joined the wider pensioners’ movement by affiliating to the National Pensioners Convention, the campaigning voice of British pensioners.

AMP chairman Tom Brown explained: “Our primary concern – and the reason for the creation of the AMP – is to protect and monitor our Mirror pensions. But it seems time to ask whether we should be doing more to represent our members’ interests on a wider front.

“Almost every week brings a new announcement affecting pensioners. Increasingly, there are issues on pensions and benefits which are being raised by AMP members who want information, or for their worries to be made known.

“Joining the Convention will widen the AMP’s contacts at a time when we are likely to need support on moves affecting company pensions, and we can influence other pensioner issues that directly concern our members.”

With immediate effect Tom Brown will sit on the NPC’s executive committee and on its national council.

The NPC, now made up of over 1,000 bodies representing 1.5 million members, was founded in 1978 because there was no single organisation which represented and campaigned on behalf of pensioners. Although it initially received TUC help, the NPC has been re-formed as “an independent and separate entity run by pensioners for pensioners” whose objective is “to promote the welfare and interests of all pensioners, as a way of securing dignity, respect and financial security in retirement”.

It has signalled its major campaigning priorities in the coming months as “cross-generation defence of the welfare state and public services on which so many older people rely”, including:

Opposition to the proposed reform of state pensions and call for a state pension set above the official poverty level.

The defence of universal pensioner benefits such as the free bus pass and the winter fuel allowance to all pensioners.

Opposition to the proposed funding arrangements for social care and the promotion of an integrated National Health and Care Service, with a nationwide Dignity Code in all health and social care settings for all older people.

The NPC have welcomed the AMP’s affiliation. National officer Neil Duncan-Jordan said: “I am confident that the Association of Mirror Pensioners will find a good home in the NPC, and have no doubt that you will be a real asset to our efforts to protect Britain’s older generation.”

The Convention’s website is www.npcuk.org – AMP members on email can also sign up to receive a free monthly e-bulletin.