Esther Shaw: Let's put our foot down on pensions

Working into what I thought would be my retirement is not a prospect I relish. I'm happy with the idea of being in a job until I'm 65, but after that I fancy a comfortable old age with time on my hands.

Working into what I thought would be my retirement is not a prospect I relish. I'm happy with the idea of being in a job until I'm 65, but after that I fancy a comfortable old age with time on my hands.

Alas, it is becoming apparent to me, my generation - and other generations too - that this could well be a luxury few of us will get to enjoy.

Time and again, we're told this is because most people are not saving for retirement, and that the state is unable to cope with its growing burden.

A burden that, following the election, is being shouldered by David Blunkett, the new Pensions Secretary.

No one can say this is an easy job, given the gaping £57bn pensions gap between what Britons are putting by and what they will actually need to enjoy a decent retirement. But somehow he's got to find a way of filling it.

Addressing the annual meeting of the National Association of Pension Funds in Manchester last week, Mr Blunkett said nothing was "off limits" - including compulsion.

While forcing people to save may seem a little extreme, the need to get heavy-handed will depend on the success of the alternatives.

A lot rides on the findings of Adair Turner, the man charged with investigating the UK's pensions crisis.

In the interim report last October from his Pensions Commission, his proposed solutions comprised encouraging people to save more, raising more in taxes, or lifting the retirement age.

But Mr Blunkett says none of these in isolation is sufficient - and this is why he refuses to rule out the possibility of compulsion.

Already, the critics have responded. Sir Digby Jones, director general of the CBI, said it would simply be seen as another stealth tax.

Elsewhere, pension provider Friends Provident said it favoured incentives that encourage people to sign up voluntarily to pension investment, while encouraging employers to deliver decent provision for their workers.

Now, I don't dispute that voluntary saving is far preferable. But at the same time, I don't think any amount of imploring from the Government, the financial industry and consumer groups is really going to make a difference - if past experience is anything to go by. Put simply, when it comes to pension saving, for many it's easier just to ignore it.

I speak from personal experience in that it took me several years of talking and procrastinating before I finally got around to setting up my own pension. And yet now that I've done it, I find it doesn't hurt half as much as I thought it would - in terms of the dent in my earnings and the disposable income I have left to play with.

Moreover, on those occasions when I catch myself thinking about how I could have spent the money instead on yet another pair of shoes, I console myself with the knowledge that I won't be wholly reliant on the state in my later years. (By which time I'll no longer have much need for a pair of Jimmy Choos anyway.)

So, while compulsion does seem extreme, if that's what it takes to get people to save, I think there is a place for it.

After all, now that I can count myself (somewhat smugly) among the UK's responsible savers, being forced to save doesn't seem so different - or so bad an idea.

Had I been compelled to save, I would probably have started earlier and might be a step nearer to retiring at 65, Only my collection of footwear would have suffered.

Sam Dunn is away