A seaside town where the average life expectancy is as low as 67 years old is in uproar at government plans to increase the state pension age to 68. For decades, Blackpool has been a popular holiday destination for millions of Brits but hidden away from the much loved illuminations and the thrills of Pleasure Beach rides is the severe poverty faced there.
According to government figures in 2019, the town had eight out of ten of the most deprived neighbourhoods in England. Inside Blackpool's Bloomfield ward the average life expectancy of men is only 67 years and three months, the Mirror reports.
Locals in the resort have responded to the governments 'bonkers' new plan to increase the state pension age to even older as they argue 'we are going to end up working until we die'.
Builder Alex Johnston, from nearby Lytham St Annes, branded the government’s pension plan as 'bonkers'.
The 24-year-old said: “If the life expectancy is younger than the age of retirement, something is going wrong. Even when people do get their pensions they still have to live modestly most of the time.
"It is not really possible for us in the construction industry to work to that age. I have been doing this for five or six years and can already feel the toll it is taking on my body because of the amount of heavy lifting we have to do.
"With a lot of the hazardous materials we have to deal with, the dust, even with the PPE we wear, it is still a higher risk for respiratory problems, which will probably end up lowering our life expectancy.”
Leanne Hewitt, 38, who runs a nearby electrical goods store worries that the state pension age will head towards 'the mid 70s' as she believes she won't ever live to see hers.
She said: "We will be literally working into our graves. People are trying to get as much work as we can, just to be able to eat, just to be able to live. And life expectancy is going to go down, if people can’t afford to eat or keep themselves warm.”
Her assistant Cat Barry, 39, said: “We are looking at getting our pensions in another 30 years, but by then the state pension age will have gone up again. And people will not be able to physically do it.”
She added: “People have worked all their lives, and for what, to be told you have to work longer? Even when they do retire, the money is not enough to live on because the cost of living has gone up so much.
“I had a private pension but I had to stop it because I could not afford to keep paying into it.” John O'Connor, 34 who runs a hotel in the Bloomfield ward alongside his partner Louise Brown, 35 said the new plan is a 'joke'.
He said: “My dad is 62 and he has another five years to go before he gets his pension and he has worked all his life, and now they want to increase it again? It is wrong.
“It is a joke, especially when you look at the life expectancy around here. The retirement age should be getting lower, not higher.”
Louise added: “We are going to end up working until we die. People are not going to be able to enjoy their retirement.
She continued: “Saving is the best thing you can do if you want to take early retirement but not everybody is in a position to do that, especially now.”
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