Working Lunch looks at both issues.

From today the priority order of who gets money from a collapsed pension fund has changed.

And from next April with the introduction of the Pension Protection Fund, all people in company pension schemes will be protected if their employer goes bust.

But as yet the government hasn't been persuaded to extend that help to workers who've already lost out.

Now though there's a glimmer of hope, because the Leader of the Commons, Peter Hain, has said that there is a will to do something as long as it doesn't "cost billions of pounds".

Priority

With regular protests from the ex-employees of companies such as the collapsed steel firm, ASW, the issue of folded pension funds has been kept in the public eye.

Not only have many people lost a large part of their pensions, but while those who had already retired were taken care of, those still working bore the brunt of the losses.

From today, in new cases, those already retired will still take priority but those still in work will now come next in the pecking order ahead of annual increases for those drawing their pensions.

Malcolm: "A better sharing out of the pain"

"I think it's a better sharing out of the pain than before," says Malcolm McLean, Chief Executive of the Pensions Advisory Service.

"It still means of course that there is insufficient money to meet all the pension. It's only really a stop gap measure until the Pension Protection Fund come in from next April.

"It will produce a more equitable result albeit that pensioners may have to forego there annual increases."

Retrospective

The big change comes in April next year, with the creation of the Pension Protection Fund which will guarantee 90% of members' pensions.

But it will only apply for failures which happen after that date.

This means a major question mark still remains about retrospective compensation - will there be extra money to bail out members of schemes which have already failed?

The Chancellor, Gordon Brown, has been holding out against this because of the cost - a potential �3bn - but there's now a danger that a cross-party group of MPs will engineer an unprecedented defeat for the government on this issue in the next few weeks unless their favoured solution is adopted.

This involves using the money out of dormant bank accounts.

Frank Field is tabling an amendment to the Pensions Bill

"Every party in the commons is supporting this move," says Frank Field MP, a member of the cross-party group.

"We (are proposing we) make a first claim on what are called the unclaimed assets of banks and building societies.

"At one count there's �17,000m unclaimed and we're saying that the first charge on these should be for the pensioners. So it's not a claim on tax payers for once."

The worry for the Chancellor is that he already faces claims from other financial victims, for example, pensioners with Equitable Life policies. And if he gives in this instance, will he have to give in again?

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Annuities

If you're not fortunate enough to have a company pension you may well have a personal scheme.

The money that is saved up is used to buy an annuity - this gives an annual income for life.

How much you get can changes, largely depending on interest rates.

For instance, a �100,000 fund would have bought a 65 year old man different annual incomes in different years:
1994 - �11,530
2002 - �7,080
2004 - �7,420
(Source: Hargreaves Lansdown)

Buy or wait?

Over the last few weeks a number of providers including Canada Life, Legal & General and the Prudential have all increased their annuity rates.

So is now a good time to buy your annuity or are they likely to increase further?

"The big thing about buying an annuity is that it's a one off event," says Tom McPhail from Hargreaves Lansdown.

Tom: "We may see more annuity rate rises"

"You're locked in for rest of life. Clearly therefore it's very important to make the right decision at the right time.

"Our concern is that having looked at the numbers over the last few weeks and months, we've concluded that with bank base rates creeping up and expected to go up further over the next few months - expected to go to 5% at their peak - we may see further interest rises and more annuity rate rises.

"So it may be worth hanging on."

But even if interest rates do go up, there's no guarantee that annuity rates will follow suit.

With people living longer, pension pots will have to last longer than they were originally calculated for.