Default retirement age abolished

The default retirement age in the UK has been fully abolished after being phased out from April this year. Daybreak's Dominic Reynolds reports:

Reaching State Pension age doesn't mean you have to give up work.

You can carry on working and still receive your State Pension. You may also be able to change your working hours to suit you.

If you retire early, or stop work due to redundancy, ill-health or other reasons, your State Pension and other pensions you're entitled to may be affected.

Find out if you can have enough to live on in retirement on the Directgov website.

Your State Pension age is the earliest age you can get your State Pension. This is not the same as retirement age.

Retirement age is when you choose to retire, but you can still work after State Pension age.

Find out what your State Pension age is on the Directgov website.

The default retirement age is being phased out today.

This means if you didn't receive notice from your employer before 6 April 2011, you can’t be made to retire using the default retirement age of 65.

Your employer can only make you retire if this can be objectively justified in the particular circumstances.

If you feel your employer is treating you unfairly due to your age, you can now challenge this at an employment tribunal.

Workers can no longer be forced to retire at the age of 65 or over after today, in a move hailed as a "major milestone" by age equality campaigners.

Today marks the final day that employers can compel workers to retire under such rules, following the abolition of the Default Retirement Age (DRA) last year.