As you mentioned the word term, I don't beleive that there are any contracts on the market that fit into this category, not anymore. There was what was called a Full Costed Endowment which effectively was a With Profits savings contract with a Level Term assurance combined and certain one were written as a Dual contract whereby the Savings and Life were totally seperately, so partical encashment was possible. Not seen any of these in years. Of course, in the event of a death claim, what was actually paid out was the bid value of the units plus the value of the term policy, the policy then ceased. Effectively, having a savings policy and life policy under the same contract, thus only one policy fee. The other type is a Whole of Life but this really should not be considered as a savings policy even though many are sold as such. Of course on these, you could select a very low growth rate, which would give more of the montly cost to savings thus building up the pot, but this pot could very easiely be eaten into as time goes on in the contract.
Why don't you consider writing a life policy just to suit your needs, whether this be level, increasing, convertible, etc. and take out a seperate savings policy to suit your needs for the savings element, i.e risk exposure, lenght of savings, joint life first survivor, joint life last survivor, etc. Then at least you can access the best company for life premiums based on your circumstances and savings with a company which have the funds and history that you are comfortable with.