The Work and Pensions Committee has launched an inquiry into the income gap experienced by many just before they reach state pension age and is calling for evidence on those transition years. The inquiry comes ahead of a scheduled SPA increase from 66 to 67 from April next year.  

The inquiry launched on Monday will examine the reasons for premature retirement, inequality, the impact on pre-pensioner and pensioner poverty of upping the state pension age, and what any support to smooth the transition could look like.   

The committee announced the inquiry at the same time as it published a government response to a 2024 inquiry into pensioner poverty. In the response, the government chiefly pointed to existing policies and initiatives, such as the Pensions Commission, the triple lock and labour market initiatives, and avoided committing to an objective for the state pension.  

The group of MPs criticised that the government has not committed to an ageing society strategy as recommended. It also highlighted that when the government was asked to produce an impact assessment for the next rise in SPA, it pointed to the most recent one – published in 2013.  

MPs said that 60-64 year-olds are now the joint poorest age group among working-age adults aged 25 and over, with 22% (876,000) living in poverty in 2023-24. As the state pension age is set to rise again, they stress that “the last time the pension age went up from 65 to 66 it led to 100,000 more 65-year-olds in absolute income poverty compared to before”.   

The Institute for Fiscal Studies found in 2023 that the increase from 65 to 66 led to about a quarter of 65-year-olds ending up in poverty, more than doubling in one year.  

Committee chair Debbie Abrahams said, “In our Pensioner Poverty report we called on the government to create a coherent cross-governmental strategy that would get ahead of the consequences of an ageing society. Its response pointed to a lot of – not unwelcome – standalone policies, but nothing that amounted to a guiding star for all departments for the health of the country as it edges towards retirement. It potentially leaves people exposed to falling between the cracks.” 

She said ‘pre-pensioners’ are particularly exposed, leading to them feeling a sense of injustice after a lifetime of work. 

“We do not yet know the impact of the state pension age increase on these people,” she said, adding: “We will be investigating the scale of the need to smooth over this transition period and how it can be done.” 

The IFS in 2024 proposed increasing Universal Credit for people just before state pension age, finding that the gap between state support for those just above and just below state pension age has increased as working-age benefits have been largely frozen. It is unclear how age-dependent benefits for adults considered to be of working age would not fall foul of equality legislation. 

An increase in benefits for older adults is unlikely to be on the government’s agenda as the chancellor is expected to try to balance the books with manifesto-busting tax rises later this month, given the UK's high spending, interest payments and worse economic assumptions.  

However, twice already Labour MPs have scuppered their government’s attempts to curb spending on benefits, leading the chancellor to give an economics lesson in an unusual pre-Budget speech.  

The government has also indicated it could finally remove the two-child benefit cap to appease its MPs, which is widely blamed for driving the UK's high rate of child poverty.

Those who wish to give evidence are invited to answer a list of questions about cohort characteristics, policy context, awareness of the SPA increase, impact assessment and mitigations on the inquiry webpage by 16:00 on 19 December 2025.