State Pension Age for Women

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Wednesday 5th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Grahame Morris]

I am grateful for that intervention, and I was just about to come on to that point. These are not just my opinions; the former Pensions Minister Steve Webb said the same things. He said:

“I accept that some women did not know about it, and not everybody heard about it at the time.”

In fairness to him, he said that

“it was all over the papers at the time”.—[Official Report, 13 October 2013; Vol. 568, c. 54WH.]

However, I do not think that is good enough. The Government have failed to contact anyone affected by the pension increase.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Edward Leigh (in the Chair)]

Order. Mr Morris, you can see how many people are trying to get in. You have been very generous taking interventions, but the more interventions we have, the longer your speech and the fewer people who will be able to get in. It is entirely up to you, but you may not want to be too generous with interventions.

[Grahame Morris]

Thank you, Sir Edward. I will give way one more time.

[Dr Whitford]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. Would it not be reasonable for women facing a change in pension age of up to five or six years to expect a direct letter? The responses are, “You could have asked”, and, “We had a leaflet”, but why would women ask when they thought they knew what the retirement age was?

[Grahame Morris]

That is an excellent point, well made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Let me correct the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham). If he reads section 28 of the Scotland Act 2016, he will see that the Scottish Government are prohibited from doing anything about pensions or relating to age.

The key issue is communication. The Work and Pensions Committee said that people should have 15 years. The Government said, “Well, you did. It changed in 1995”. But they wasted 14 of those years by not informing women. They only started to write to women in 2009, one year before the first batch of women found that their pension age had changed. Many only discovered in 2011, when they were informed of the second change, that they were being hit by a double whammy.

The problem, as I mentioned earlier, is one of communication—an article in the Financial Times is not an acceptable way to inform women such as me, born in the 1950s, that our pension age is changing. HMRC and the DWP can certainly find us when they want to, so I would have thought they could send a personal letter. The idea that we should have to ask for our pension age is ridiculous when we have known what it was for our whole lives. The Government owe those women a duty of care; those women who have suffered the gender pay gap, raised children and cared for the sick—

[Norman Lamb (North Norfolk) (LD)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Dr Whitford]

I will give way.

[Norman Lamb]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving way—

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Whitford]

Those women have also faced discrimination while they were working. As a Member said earlier, they have been in poorly paid jobs—part-time or flexible work was not available. Women still occupy the bulk of low-paid jobs; women have faced and suffered 86% of all the austerity cuts since 2010. Those women have paid and paid and paid, and some of them are losing almost £50,000 of pension in the move from 60 to 66. That is utterly unjust. The Government could correct it. They should sit down on a cross-party basis to work it out, to deliver some justice, fairness and dignity for the WASPI women.