TUC general secretary John Monks criticised British companies who have removed the schemes, and are then making only a "mean" contribution to employees' replacement pensions.

	:	Trade unions guide
The big unions at TUC 2002

The TUC said it wants to restore the link between state pensions and earnings.

But the CBI responded by saying it was unrealistic to expect employers to make compulsory contributions because these were too costly.

Costly alternative

Corporate Britain, with some notable exceptions, should be hanging its head in shame

TUC

The TUC is making two key demands. It wants all companies to offer final salary pension schemes and also wants to make it compulsory for employees to join them.

Unions said on Sunday that the pension debate is now the top industrial relations issue and should be part of any negotiating package.

The TUC said companies are not putting enough into new alternative pensions and that workers are struggling to make up the shortfall.

"Even decent employers have betrayed decades of trust as they give in to City pressure to scrap quality pensions", said Mr Monks.

Unions must stop playing the blame game if they want to generate constructive proposals as well as headlines

CBI

"Corporate Britain, with some notable exceptions, should be hanging its head in shame," he added.

Unrealistic

However, the CBI is calling for a more moderate approach to the issue.

It wants a debate on pensions but says companies would struggle to keep paying the traditional schemes.

"Unions must stop playing the blame game if they want to generate constructive proposals as well as headlines," said the CBI.

The debate came on the same day as a report from the stockbroker Comdirect, suggesting more than a quarter of pensioners live on incomes of less than half the average wage.

Savings regrets

The Comdirect survey suggested over a third of pensioners wished they had saved more before retiring.

But the group also suggested young people are being put off investing by the unpredictable nature of the stock market.

Comdirect said its survey highlighted the need to "stop putting off today what they could do tomorrow".