Our children face working into their late 70s

But could our children and grandchildren arrive to find the state pension is available only to those who live to four score years or more?

Perhaps the pension will return to its roots, where only a lucky few actually live long enough to qualify.

There has been speculation that graduates and white collar workers could be made to wait longer for their pension than those who start work in their teens, thus reflecting differing mortality rates.

But this would surely cause uproar among the articulate middle classes who are most able to fight their own corner.

Estimates suggest that even if the qualifying age were raised to 70 by 2060 the state pension would consume close to 8 per cent of national income compared with 5.5 per cent now.

So society and those who pay taxes will have to decide how much they are willing to pay towards a state retirement income.

Promises such as the triple lock, guaranteeing increases of prices inflation, earnings inflation or 2.5 per cent, already look unsustainably generous.

Promises like the triple lock already look unsustainably generous

But will the pension age rise so far and fast that only those who live healthy lifestyles will benefit, while most smokers, drinkers and sugar addicts will drop before they get to draw it?

A study by website True Potential Investor suggests that 17 per cent of 35 to 44-year-olds are expecting a retirement of five years or less.

It is very easy to be lulled by today’s pensioners where many seem to be positively overflowing with cash.

Key Retirement says that pensioner property wealth now stands at close to £920bn.

Saga Investment Services says that one in 10 pensioners has deferred their state pension – suggesting that many were not desperate for the income.

But outside the public sector the final salary pensions that are funding these comfortable retirements will have vanished.

Defined contribution pensions are unlikely to be substantial enough to fund early retirement for most.

Contribution rates are not high enough, and with other calls on their income most people cannot afford to put away more.

I suspect that if those in future generations are to afford any form of early retirement – and by this I mean stopping work in their sixties – they will depend on us for help.

Inherited pensions and property may well prove the most reliable foundation if our children and grandchildren are to enjoy a glimpse of the retirement lifestyle of many of today’s pensioners.

For the rest, the prospect of working into their late 70s looms large – that is, if there are enough jobs to go around.

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Labour’s return to dark ages

Cass Business School’s professor David Blake has published the Independent Review of Retirement Income commissioned by former Labour shadow work and pensions secretary Rachel Reeves a couple of years ago.

While a few proposals, such as a decumulation charge cap, sound promising, others make me fear a return to the pre-reform dark ages.

Safe-harbour products with guarantees such as inflation and longevity protection sound suspiciously like rebadged annuities.

And we all now how much it costs – or how much insurance companies charge – to provide guarantees.

Clearer risk labelling would be welcome – although what would constitute high risk would, I suspect, be open to debate.

What is worrying is the lack of consensus between the main parties on pensions. The Tories and the Liberal Democrats have both argued that this is our money and we should be able to do what we want with it.

Labour appears to think it knows how our money should be used and how we should be allowed to use it.

While the changes being proposed may not be proscriptive, they could cause more confusion among investors and unease in the industry.

This bodes ill for anyone working in the sector who must fear more rule changes if Labour wins the 2020 election – though the prospects of this currently appear to be dim.

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More innovation for older clients

Leeds Building Society is planning to look at underserved areas of the mortgage market, including part interest-only.

Let us hope this includes lending to older borrowers who can demonstrate the ability to pay. It will already lend to age 80, much older than the major banks.

Building societies are being far more innovative in their approach to lending than banks.

As long as they can do so within safe boundaries, this is a welcome development and proves why this sector is so important to both savers and borrowers.

Tony Hazell writes for the Daily Mail’s Money Mail section