Chancellor Jeremy Hunt confirmed during his Autumn Statement that the UK Government’s review of the State Pension age will be published in early 2023 and is scheduled to be released in May. At the start of this year, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) launched a second review of the State Pension age, which is now 66 for men and women across the UK.
State Pension age is regularly reviewed to make sure that it is affordable and fair as people are living longer and spending a greater proportion of their adult life in retirement than in the past. The DWP has previously explained the reason for the review is because "when the State Pension was introduced in 1948, a 65-year-old could expect to spend 13.5 years receiving the benefit, around 23 per cent of their adult life".
However, this has been increasing ever since and it is now estimated that a 65-year-old can expect to live for another 22.8 years, or 33.6 per cent of their adult life in retirement. The latest projections from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that the number of people over State Pension age in the UK is expected to grow by a third to 16.9 million in 2042.
