Women’s State Pension Age: Ombudsman Report

Alan Brown Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). Like everybody else, I commend my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) for securing this debate, and for all the work she has done in speaking up for 3.8 million affected women for all these years. I also commend all the other Members who have spoken in today’s debate; there have been powerful speeches, and powerful but harrowing stories of how various constituents have been affected by the increases in the state pension age for women.

There is a Back-Bench consensus today that the Government have dragged their heels, that a response is now long overdue, and that compensation is due. We have also disproved the nonsense that women should have known about the increases in their state pension age. Financial advisers and lawyers did not even know: as my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) said, divorces were granted on the basis of women accessing their pensions at the age of 60.

Some Labour Back Benchers today have rightly criticised the Government for their lack of action and for their policies elsewhere, but then somehow bristled at SNP speakers calling out the silence of their own Front Benchers. We are willing to work cross-party, but we also need pressure for action. If we do not call out what we think is wrongdoing, we are not doing the right thing for the WASPI women who we are all here to represent today.

We would not be in this Chamber today, debating this issue as parliamentarians, if not for fantastic campaigners such as Ayrshire WASPI Group, Cunninghame WASPI Group, WASPI in my constituency, WASPI Scotland, and of course the wider WASPI organisation. I pay tribute to my constituent Ann Hammell, who brought the issue to my attention in my early period as an MP in 2015. Again, it was heartening to hear so many MPs commend their own local campaigners.

Turning to the ombudsman’s report, there are a few key aspects: the findings and confirmation of maladministration in the DWP, compensation to be paid, and Government failures. I will explore each in turn. The ombudsman has not only confirmed that it believes that the DWP is guilty of maladministration, but has expressed outright anger at the belligerence of the Department and, by default, this Tory Government. I welcome the robust comments of the ombudsman’s chief executive, Rebecca Hilsenrath, who has stated:

“The UK’s national Ombudsman has made a finding of failings by DWP in this case and has ruled that the women affected are owed compensation. DWP has clearly indicated that it will refuse to comply. This is unacceptable.”

I agree with her.

It beggars belief that, in 2024, the Government are suddenly pretending that this ombudsman’s report is a bolt out of the blue and very complex. It is three years since the ombudsman found that the DWP was guilty of maladministration because of its lack of communication about increasing the state pension age. It is scandalous that the ombudsman is actually having to ask Parliament to find a way to create a mechanism to provide compensation for those affected. If the ombudsman does not trust the UK Government to do the right thing, I do not trust them either.

Unfortunately, at the moment I also do not trust the official Opposition, who have been too quiet on the report findings to date. That is why I have brought forward my private Member’s Bill, the State Pension Age (Compensation) Bill, which sets out a compensation framework. We need to remember that the Prime Minister was the Chancellor who boasted about setting up the furlough scheme in a couple of weeks for the covid lockdown. Clearly, if there is a Government will, there is a way, so why do the Government not have the will to get on with a compensation scheme for the WASPI women?

In the ombudsman’s report, compensation is unfortunately set at just level 4, which feels wrong. For the majority of the 3.8 million women affected, it feels like a smack in the face. Compensation of between £1,000 and £2,950 is an inadequate maximum payout. The WASPI APPG recommended level 6 for the worst affected, and my private Member’s Bill takes a similar approach. I have suggested a framework that follows the clear logic that those affected by the biggest increase in state pension age, while in effect having the shortest notice period, should receive the most compensation.

As for the 2.5 million women who have had to wait five years or more to access their pension, it would be absurd to award them just level 4 compensation of less than £3,000. In my framework, they would be allocated compensation at PHSO level 6, which is about £10,000. Those who have not had to wait quite as long, but who were still badly affected in some cases, will get levels 4 and 5, with a minority on lower levels. I thank Members from across the House who have signed my private Member’s Bill.

This subject has been debated in Parliament for nine years, and for over nine years these women and their families have been fighting for justice. It is tragic that, as has been repeated many times, the women are dying at a rate of 40,000 a year, or one WASPI woman every 13 minutes, and they are not getting the justice they deserve. This underlines that it is critical that Parliament takes action now.

However, there has not even been a suggestion on the way forward from the official Opposition. They should be putting proposals to the Government, and saying what they would do if they were in government. If their solution was accepted by the Government, they could then claim credit for getting compensation over the line. Instead, we have heard nothing from the Opposition—zip—apart from weasel words about listening. I hope the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), will change my mind and offer proposals during her summing up, but there was a bad example last week in the Scottish Parliament, when Labour MPs sat on their hands when it came to voting for compensation for the WASPI women. They had the temerity to get photographs taken with the campaigners, and to tell them that they backed them, but then they went into the Chamber in Holyrood, sat on their hands and actively abstained, which was disgraceful.

As I say, I hope the shadow Minister will bring forward proposals, but I would like her and the Minister responding to the debate to consider the constituents’ stories we have heard today, and a few of mine as well. Lynn was exhausted after working for 34 years in the NHS and agreed to take early retirement at 55, but she found out on her last day of work that it would be 11 years before she got the state pension, not the five years she anticipated. Nancy was widowed at the age of 54, while she was working part time, which was clearly traumatic emotionally and financially. She has suffered umpteen chronic health conditions while caring for her parents, but was forced to take NHS bank work just to survive.

Lesley, who has sometimes worked three jobs to make ends meet, was a carer for her partner when he had cancer, a carer for her dad when he had cancer, and had a period of travelling to Southampton every weekend to visit her aunt—superwoman efforts that would exhaust anybody. It is little wonder that she took early retirement age 56, only to discover later that she had to wait six years longer than she thought to access her pension.

Do not dare tell those women and others like them that they need to wait longer for justice. These are women who did not have maternity rights back in the day. They were paid less than men, and were more likely to work part time, and their private pensions were smaller, if they had them. In reality, pension age equalisation has further disadvantaged those women, especially as they were told that to get a full pension, they had to pay extra NI contributions. It is time that the right thing was done, and that right thing is fair and fast compensation now.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I call the shadow Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Maynard]

If I may, I will answer that in a moment, because I will now turn back to the report. In laying the report before Parliament, the ombudsman brought matters to the House’s attention, making it clear that Parliament has a role in responding to the report. The Government intend to engage fully and constructively with Parliament. I view this debate as a crucial part of that process.

I remind the House about what the ombudsman’s report says—and indeed does not say. The ombudsman has looked not at the decision to equalise the state pension age but rather at how that decision was communicated by the DWP. That is important to understand, as the motion calls on the Government to

“deliver prompt compensation to women born in the 1950s who had their State Pension age raised.”

Importantly, the ombudsman’s report hinted at the Department’s decisions over a narrow period between 2005 and 2007, and their effect on individual notifications. The ombudsman has not found that women have directly lost out financially as a result DWP actions. The report stated:

“We do not find that it”—

the DWP’s communication—

“resulted in them suffering direct financial loss.”

The final report does not say that all women born in the 1950s will have been adversely impacted, as many women were aware that the state pension age had changed. The stage 1 report found that between 1995 and 2004, the DWP’s communication of changes to the state pension age reflected the standards that the ombudsman would expect it to meet. That report also confirmed that accurate information about changes to the state pension age was publicly available in leaflets, through the DWP pension education campaigns and DWP agencies and on its website. However, when considering the Department’s actions between August 2005 and December 2007, the ombudsman came to the view that they resulted in 1950s-born women receiving individual notice later than they might have done had different decisions been made.

I welcome the wide-ranging contributions from Members on behalf of their constituents.

[Alan Brown]

The ombudsman clearly said that the DWP was guilty of maladministration during the period of 2005 to 2007. Does the Minister accept the finding that the DWP was guilty of maladministration, and should put its hands up to that?

[Paul Maynard]

I recognise that there will be an appetite from some Opposition Members for the Government to respond item by item to different parts of the ombudsman’s report, but the Government wish to respond in full when they have reached a conclusion from their deliberations. I will not go down the path that the hon. Gentleman seeks to take me along.

Some of the detailed commentary from Members today illustrates the interlocking considerations at play, depending on how each Member of Parliament responds to the report. The fact that so many have spoken today demonstrates the importance of this issue. Many parliamentary activities are worth noting to understand how they fit in. The Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms), mentioned the evidence session held last week and the recommendation that he has made to the Department, which I read after he mentioned it, so I have only just seen it.

Late last month I was able to meet the hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey) and my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), the chair and co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group, to discuss our initial views of the report and what steps they intended to pursue to take further evidence. I am looking forward to seeing what they have to say. I have noted the evidence given last week to the Select Committee. I also took careful note of what occurred in the Scottish Parliament. The many views expressed so far provide valuable input to the ongoing deliberations.

Let me come to the question from the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) about the written answer she received. I will take my glasses off to read this, because the print is very small and not clear: in November 2023, alongside other interested parties, the DWP received a copy of the PHSO’s revised provisional views on injustice, which was stage two of the inquiry, and remedies, which were stage three, for comment. The DWP responded with its comments in January 2024. The Department was notified by the PHSO on 19 March that the final report would be received on 21 March 2024, at a meeting between the permanent secretary and the ombudsman. I note that the hon. Lady’s written question was about the final report as opposed to the preliminary report.