MANUFACTURERS in the region want the Government to set a standard retirement age of 65 when it introduces European Union legislation on age discrimination in October 2006, a survey has found.

The survey of companies, by The Engineering Employers Federation (EEF), comes ahead of what is probably the final meeting this week of the Government's retirement age taskforce, which was set up to recommend retirement age policies once age discrimination laws are introduced.

The EEF survey showed that two-thirds of 525 companies want a standard retirement age of 65 to be set, with only a quarter of them wanting the age set at 70.

It also showed that many manufacturing companies are employing some older workers.

Only one in four already has full-time employees over their company's normal retirement age, which in the vast majority of cases was 65. Nearly a third had some part-time employees over 65.

Alan Hall, EEF Northern director, said: "These results confirm that there is strong support among manufacturers for having a standard retirement age of 65 when age discrimination legislation is introduced.

"However, the number of manufacturing companies employing full-time or part-time employees beyond their normal retirement age suggests that employers and their older employees are agreeing voluntary arrangements which are felt to be mutually beneficial.

"The Government is already pursuing a positive approach to the culture change that is needed to encourage the employment of older employees though its Age Positive programme. This approach is the right way forward and is likely to receive far greater support from employers than introducing age discrimination legislation in a way that creates complex and expensive problems for employers."

The survey showed that nearly 90 per cent of manufacturing companies wanted the state pension age to remain at 65 after 2020.