SIR – Although state pension provision has got into a bit of a mess over the years with previously a different retiring age for men and women until recently, plus complexities like state graduated pensions from the 1960s or SERPS from the 1970s and more recently pension credits adding to the confusion and bureaucracy, the Coalition does seem to be trying to make a better universal system.

The revised National Insurance qualifying period of 30 years and proposed flat rate pension of around £140 a week, or even £155 as is now suggested, could eliminate many present anomalies, providing no-one, especially women, loses out.

But of course the main problem of affordability is the actual age when pensions are awarded. In 1908 when a state pension of 25p a week was introduced, you had to be aged 70 to get it, and very few working men and women ever did.

If those same actuarial principles were used today in calculating the optimum age, with increased life expectancy due to better living conditions, diet and medical care and less physically demanding work, then the future retirement age could be as high as 80 when my youngest grandchild, now aged six, retires!

D S Boyes, Rodley Lane, Leeds