State must spend billions to defuse pension timebomb

THE State will have to spend billions more than it envisaged on pensions in the coming decades, a Government strategy report indicated yesterday.

Current projections, published in a report sent to the EU, show pension spending as a percentage of GNP will rise from 4.6% in 2000 to 9% in 2050.

“However,” the report states, “revised population projections by the Central Statistics Office, and initial work done in the context of the National Pensions Review, suggest that this figure is significantly understated.”