Diarmaid Ferriter: Old-age pension is about much more than money

When Éamon de Valera looked back on 50 years of the Gaelic League in 1943, he made much of the idea of social solidarity and the balancing of rights and responsibilities: “The Ireland which we dreamed of would be the home of a people who valued material wealth only as a basis of right living, of a people who were satisfied with frugal comfort and devoted their lives to things of the spirit – a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads, whose fields and villages would be joyous with the sounds of industry, with the romping of sturdy children, the contests of athletic youths and the laughter of comely maidens, whose firesides would be forums for the wisdom of serene old age.”

The idea of fostering respect for the status, serenity and wisdom of our elders remained an attractive and laudable aim

In 1998, the historian Joe Lee suggested that rather than sneeringly dismissing this much-cited speech, we could instead purge it “of the archaism of the de Valera lexicon – his vocabulary was, after all, that of one of the last of the great Victorians – and translate it into language more familiar today”. What he concluded was that, while de Valera’s focus was on a rural rather than an urban Ireland, it amounted to a desire to see a well-populated country, with full employment, good housing, healthy children, an interest in sport and respect for the elderly: “De Valera’s model emphasised the essential links between the generations as he identified his ideal for the dependent ages in society – childhood, youth and old age.”

Over time, we moved far from satisfaction with frugal comfort and things of the spirit and we could look ironically on the phrase “the romping of sturdy children” given that so many were betrayed, as were far too many of our supposed “comely maidens”. But the idea of fostering respect for the status, serenity and wisdom of our elders remained an attractive and laudable aim.

Welfare fraud

State support for pensioners long predated de Valera’s Ireland, as did its financial implications. The old-age pension was introduced by a British Liberal government in 1908 and, as underlined by the economic historian Cormac Ó Gráda, was embraced so enthusiastically in Ireland that its cost caused consternation in London. This newspaper noted wryly in 1909 that “with fewer inhabitants than Scotland by a quarter of a million, Ireland has established claims to nearly 74,000 more pensions. This surely is a major tribute to the longevity of our race and to the healthy character of our much abused climate”. In truth, this was partly about welfare fraud on a grand scale due to lying about age in order for those supposedly at or over the qualifying age of 70 to receive the five shillings. Compulsory registration of births had not been introduced in Ireland until 1864, hence the scope for skulduggery.

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We have been drowning in references to the pension 'time bomb' for decades, not least because of the dramatic transformation in life expectancy

There was surely much satisfaction on the part of a colonised people that they could raid the imperial exchequer for more than their share, though it was no laughing matter when the new Free State discovered that the pension – doubled to a maximum of 10 shillings after the first World War – absorbed the bulk of welfare spending. Minister for finance Ernest Blythe took a shilling off the pension in 1924, creating a furore, and, as noted by Ó Gráda, the delicacy around fiscal retrenchment in such an area continued to resonate in to the early 21st century. The pension, in short, proved to be “a fiscal nightmare”, but it also released thousands from the indignity of poor relief or the workhouse and allowed elderly farmers to “retire gracefully and pass their land on”.

Life expectancy

At the time of pension controversies in the 1920s, life expectancy in Ireland was just under 58 years for both males and females. The shilling was restored in 1928 and the pension was not increased again until 1948, while in 1973 provision was made for pensioners to receive the pension even if they had income of up to £4 per week, and political sensitivity about targeting the pension for cuts remained acute.

In parallel, we have been drowning in references to the pension “time bomb” for decades, not least because of the dramatic transformation in life expectancy; by 2016, the figures had increased to 79.6 years for men and 83.4 years for women. It has long been clear there are different ways to defuse the bomb; increase the retirement age, make higher contributions while working or endure a smaller income once retired.

But as we have been reminded this week by the Oireachtas committee report arguing against increasing the retirement age, and as the history of the pensions debate illustrates, there is usually the dominance of what constitutes the favoured option for political as opposed to social solidarity reasons. The idea of “serene old age” is crucially connected to income security, but it also has to be linked to the numerous long-term burdens facing today’s athletic youths.