State Pension Changes: Women Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Ben Lake
Main Page: Ben Lake (Plaid Cymru - Ceredigion Preseli)Department Debates - View all Ben Lake's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(8 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)
I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for securing this important debate, and for all his work on this very important matter in at least the seven years that I have been in this place
I rise to speak in support of over 5,000 WASPI women in Ceredigion, and I begin by commending the WASPI campaign group there that has done so much in recent years to support those affected by pension changes. It has also done so much to raise awareness locally, and indeed nationally in Wales, of the injustice that women born after 6 April 1950 have suffered as a result of the changes introduced by the Pensions Act 1995 and the Pensions Act 2011.
I want to reinforce the point, mentioned by others, that we are talking about a generation of women who have suffered greatly throughout their lives. The injustice that they are suffering now has sadly come upon a lifetime of many injustices. As we have heard, they will have entered an unequal workforce, and they will have suffered greatly in society due to the inequality that previously plagued the United Kingdom as they grew up and came into adulthood.
Nevertheless, they are a generation of women who have contributed so much to bringing about positive change for the benefit of us all. Not only are they the mams, the mamgus, the sisters and the aunties, but they are ones who work tirelessly in various campaign groups, community organisations and causes. Yet after a lifetime of working diligently, they find themselves at the very end having to suffer financially and emotionally due to changes introduced by the state that were not communicated to them as they should have been.
The fact of the matter is that many of these women do not complain, as the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely) said. They live their lives according to the law and they expect, very reasonably, that the state then recognises their contribution—that social contract—yet they have been failed so terribly by the failure of the Department for Work and Pensions to communicate the changes to their pension entitlements. To top it all off, after the ombudsman found that maladministration had taken place, the Department and the Government refused to acknowledge that maladministration. That is rubbing salt into the wound—I would venture—and I hope the Minister can address that.
Others have mentioned how these women have suffered not only financial harm but social harm, and their quality of life has been severely impacted. For that reason, I believe that when it comes to compensation we have to move away from the level 5 offered by the ombudsman. It needs to be much higher to reflect the fact that not only have they suffered financially but their lives have been put on hold and, as has been mentioned, sadly many of them have passed away before seeing justice. We cannot waste any more time on this matter.