Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The age of 66 remains the core rate and it is the bedrock of our pension system. International experience is that very few people actually defer but we wanted to give them the flexibility as to whether they want to make those choices. The deferred pension is not a higher pension. It is an actuarial adjustment because people are obviously not drawing down their pension and they are working that bit longer to increase their contributions. They are paying more contributions into the system. I am happy that what we are doing here is the right thing to give people the choice if they want to work on. We have look at this and the Pensions Commission looked at it in detail as well. I am satisfied that this is the way forward. Of course, like anything else, it can be reviewed down the road. That will be up to these Houses to decide. It can be changed, but this the best offering we can put forward at this time.