Also, ask youself this: how many careworkers or cleaners are now employed directly by local authorities? The answer is: less and less. The majority of public sector workers are part of the ’squeezed middle’ and are not on low pay.

I agree with you that trade unions must, by their nature, ’start where people are’ (meaning, their member, I suppose). However, their members – overwhelmingly now in the public sector – constitute only 20% of the workforce; the other 80% remain on the whole (at best) ambivalent about pension rights in the public sector.

That is why socialist organisations need to take a wider view and develop a realistic policy/ campaign which unites as many people as possible in defence of fair and decent pensions for all.

Did we learn nothing from the 1980s? Broadening the resistance is the only hope for retaining good pensions in the public sector.

Yes, it would be nice to broaden peoples “sectional interests”, but we have to start where people are. I think it’s worthwhile to point out that a reason why the Tories are out to change public sector pensions is to make then unaffordable for most people who work in the public sector. Therefore, most people will opt out and so make the pension funds more unsustainable. If you look at most public sector schemes whilst there is an employer contribution, payments also come from employees salaries. Funds are then invested in various areas such as the stock market. If your pension contributions are to rise and your pay has been frozen for yet another year (ie. you have had a pay cut in real terms) then in order to pay for your rent or mortgage, etc, you will think about cutting back on “non-essentials” which for some can include dropping out of the pension scheme. Most public-sector pension schemes are relatively responsive to members’ control, as a proportion of the pension trustees are appointed from the trade unions, which for all there faults do have a measure of member control. You don’t have that with private pensions. With many private schemes up to 25% of your contributions are taken as administration fees, ie. profit for the pension providers.

Not all public sector workers are on poor pay (in fact many of them are well renumerated) and the unions only seem to see things in terms of protecting existing conditions, not restoring fairness to the pensions system as a whole.

It is also valid to question public sector pension schemes which are paid out of general taxation rather than members’ contributions and fund investments.

I tend to think that the role of the ILP is to challenge the Left to confront difficult issues – so that it can be more radical and effective – rather than to go along with the crowd. Perhaps inevitably the unions will pursue narrow sectional interests, but socialists should be broadening their horizons and calling for sweeping reforms to the whole pensions system.