The mortgage of retirement

The financial adviser Arthur Childs, of Surrey-based Arch Financial Planning, likened a pension to a kitchen in a recent note to his clients, which is a novel and more accessible way of describing them to the average person who is not embroiled in the nitty gritty of the industry.

Childs elaborated on how the kitchen forms the central part of many households and over the years it is developed and renovated as needs and budgets change. The low cost version of the kitchen is of course the stakeholder, which has been largely ignored by everyone except the advisory community. With the current discussion about pensions planning focusing on the increased contributions required from many segments of the population, the government would do well to publicise the benefits of stakeholder. There is much talk and excitement about the arrival of the Children’s ISA, but for...