Savings call over centenary stats

Figures showing that 20-year-olds are three times more likely to reach their 100th birthdays than their grandparents have prompted calls to increase saving.

Department for Work and Pensions statistics showed that people who have recently concluded their second decade were also twice as likely to receive a telegram from the Queen than their own parents.

Pensions minister Steve Webb said the figures underline the need for Britons to save more for their retirement.

The findings - based on Office for National Statistics predictions - also showed that a baby born during 2011 is almost eight times more likely to reach 100 than those born in 1931. In 2066 there will be at least half a million centenarians, according to the statistics.

Mr Webb said: "These figures show just how great the differences in life expectancy between generations really are.

"The dramatic speed at which life expectancy is changing means that we need to radically rethink our perceptions about our later lives.

"We simply can't look to our grandparents' experience of retirement as a model for our own.

"We will live longer and we will have to save more."

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