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<p>While we can’t draw a direct link between the triple lock and pensioner poverty,
pensioner poverty is at one of the lowest rates since records began, with 100,000
fewer pensioners in relative poverty (after housing costs) than there were in 2009/10.
Pensioners are now less likely to be in relative and absolute low income after housing
costs than the population as a whole. The Government continues to support the poorest
pensioners, not least through Pension Credit which tops up income to a guaranteed
minimum level of £155.60 for a single person and £237.55 for couples.</p><p>The Government
wants all pensioners to have a decent and secure income in retirement. We have committed
to maintain the triple lock to 2020, the guarantee that both the basic State Pension
and the new State Pension will increase by the highest of the growth in average earnings,
price increase or 2.5%. The full basic State Pension is now over £1,100 a year higher
than it was at the start of the last Parliament. This is benefitting many of the 17,000
recipients of the State Pension in Woking, the 1.7 million recipients in the South
East and the 13 million recipients in the UK.</p>
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