The two Pension Education Fund projects that aim to increase the financial awareness and retirement planning of those in their early 50s and, in conjunction with the Royal Bath and West of England Society, the agricultural and horticultural sectors reached the delivery stage in 2006/07. Half of the delivery phase was completed in the year with the remainder to follow in 2007/08. The outcomes at the half way stage were very encouraging. The evaluation showed a 50% increase in retirement planning activity of the workshop participants in the agriculture and horticulture sectors in the three months following the workshops. There was also a significant increase in those seeing an improvement in their work life balance. For those in their early 50's the evaluation showed that within three months of the workshops:
- 59% of respondents had obtained a state pension forecast
- 77% had looked at their occupational/personal pension fund statement
- 45% had sought financial planning advice
- 45% had increased their savings/investments for retirement
- 25% of those eligible had increased their contributions to their pension
- 27% had changed their intentions about retirement (with the majority intending to work longer)
We joined with the charity Tax Help for Older People to successfully bid for funding from HM Revenue and Customs to develop a workbook "Taxation at Retirement" and run six workshops for those in the voluntary sector to enable them to better support individuals at and beyond retirement on tax issues. We received an enthusiastic response to the offer of workshops and we ran workshops in London, Leamington Spa, Chester, Bradford, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne and Stockton-on-Tees. The evaluations showed a large increase in the understanding of tax issues by those in the voluntary sector as a result of the workshops and an increased capacity to support individuals seeking help on taxation from voluntary sector organisations. The workshops also revealed that the voluntary sector is experiencing an increasing workload of individuals with tax issues. This project went well and we bid for further funding to run twelve workshops in 2007/08 which we were delighted to learn was successful.
The Leonardo da Vinci project on Intergenerational Portfolio Management commenced in October 2006. Our UK partner in this project is NHS Employers and by the end of the year the pilot work in Medway NHS Trust was underway. We learned in January 2007 that a second Leonardo da Vinci bid had been successful. This project is led by Polish colleagues and the work commenced with the "kick off" meeting hosted by Life Academy in July 2007.
Our work as part of the Potentia Age Diversity project for the Welsh Development Agency had been so well received that our remit had been extended. The Welsh Development Agency was absorbed into Welsh Assembly Government on 1 April 2006. The project was due for completion in December 2006 and we were extremely disappointed that as a result of the machinery of government change we were advised the project could no longer be funded. This project represented a major undertaking by Life Academy and cancellation of the project without warning with £50,000 of work outstanding inevitably had financial implications for us.
