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Old Age Pension Act 1908

The successes of this were:

• people over 70 with an annual income of £21 to £31 would receive a pension (1 to 5 shillings per week)
• by 1914, 1 million people were receiving a pension

The limitations of this were:

• many pensioners had no birth certificate to prove their age
• those who earned over £31 did not receive anything
• the pension was not enough to survive on as it was below the poverty line established by Booth and Rowntree
• many died from hardship before they reached 70 years of age

Pensions were only provided if people:

• were British and had lived in the UK for 20 years
• had not been imprisoned in the last ten years
• had not avoided work
• had avoided detention under the Inebriates Act in the last ten years