Women’s State Pension Age: Ombudsman Report

Grahame Morris Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

It is an honour to follow the hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Allan Dorans), and I thank the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) for securing this important debate. I was rather disappointed that she used the opportunity to bash the Labour party. With all due respect, I point out that, had we won the election in 2017—my right hon. Friends the Members for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) can confirm this—this matter would have been settled. Had the SNP not lost 13 seats to the Conservatives, we would not be having this debate; we would have delivered justice for the WASPI women and for the miners, who are desperate to have pensions justice.

I want to extend my personal appreciation to the dedicated women of the WASPI campaign who have tirelessly campaigned for nearly a decade for fair and timely compensation for 1950s women affected by the DWP’s maladministration.

I do not recognise the criticism of Labour Members. I think that I have raised WASPI cases on 25 occasions in 12 different debates and remember how many Members were in their place. I remember a Westminster Hall debate where Members were sitting on the window sills because it was so crowded. Every effort has been made to bring this injustice to the attention of the public and the Government.

I thank the Sunderland, Durham and Hartlepool WASPI groups, who have worked diligently and assiduously in my constituency. I have had the pleasure of meeting and working with those remarkable women over the past decade, and I am full of admiration for their dedication and selflessness. There are around 5,000 WASPI women in my constituency, who have been waiting patiently for the final ombudsman’s report, which was published in March. I am appalled that the DWP refuses to comply with the report’s recommendations. This unprecedented response undermines the ombudsman’s authority and credibility. The Library found no other instances of a Government Department rejecting an ombudsman’s findings.

The DWP must own its mistakes, apologise to the 3.8 million women affected and swiftly deliver adequate compensation. There is no doubt that the DWP failed to notify 1950s women of their state pension age change, and now it denies its wrongdoings, as the PHSO highlighted. Ignoring the ombudsman’s findings sets a dangerous precedent, allowing Government Departments to evade accountability. We MPs have a responsibility to ensure that the Government establish a mechanism for redress. The urgency is critical. I do not want to rehearse the statistics, because they have been given many times, but the 1950s women are dying in numbers because of the age profile.

In March, the Secretary of State promised an update, but as far as I am aware we are still waiting for that. The Government’s standard delay tactics—evident in cases such as the mineworkers’ pension scheme, the contaminated blood scandal, the Post Office Horizon scandal and now the WASPI women—must end. The impact of the state pension age rise on those women, with little or no notice, is profound. The APPG on state pension inequality for women, chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey), highlighted that women felt worthless, ignored and disempowered, leading to severe mental health issues and, in some very sad cases, suicide.

There is no doubt that the DWP’s maladministration has caused immense stress. The evidence aligns that with the PHSO’s definition of level 6 emotional injustice, warranting compensation of up to £10,000. As Members have said, the Government have saved £181.5 billion by accelerating the raising of the women’s state pension age. Compensating WASPI women by up to £10,000 would cost around £36 billion. That is a fraction of the savings accrued by the Treasury to date.

I recently met my constituents Denise McKenna and Kathleen Kerr, who illustrate the severe impact this issue has had. Both started work at 16. Kathy joined the British Army and Denise started work at the Inland Revenue. In their late 50s they took early retirement due to ill health. They carefully managed their finances. They had only a few years, they thought, until they reached their retirement. As a married couple who were both WASPI women, Kathy and Denise suffered a double whammy—an immense financial loss, due to the pension age change. They received no written notification of the change. The five-year delay to their pension meant that they lost in excess of £80,000. They exhausted their life savings and were forced to sell their home. Surely that is not how we respect those who have worked and served our country.

Many WASPI women like Denise and Kathy made significant life decisions without knowing that their pension age had increased. That injustice demands financial redress. Women were forced to return to work, despite disabilities and conditions. That highlights this Government’s disconnect from the realities that these women faced. A former Pensions Minister, the hon. Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), now a Transport Minister responsible for buses, suggested in a Westminster Hall debate in 2017 that the affected women should retrain and take up apprenticeships—[Interruption.] It was greeted with a similar reaction at the time. That ignores the challenges of re-entering the labour market, and the disproportionate care-giving responsibilities that these women bear.

Successive Governments have failed these women. It is our responsibility and the duty of this Parliament to right this wrong. Sadly, it is too late for the over 200,000 WASPI women who have passed away since the campaign started in 2015, but we cannot delay any longer. Compensation is not just financial reimbursement, but recognition of the harm inflicted on these women. My appeal to the Minister is this: heed the calls for justice, and acknowledge the emotional and psychological harm caused by the Government’s decisions and the DWP’s maladministration. As representatives of thousands of 1950s women, it is our responsibility as Members of Parliament to ensure that justice is served.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I have lived this campaign for about 10 years, as have a number of other hon. Members. Today, we have heard unanimity from speakers from all political parties across the House. Unless we can get some action quickly, I despair of what parliamentary procedure is left to us. I do not want to go back to swinging the Mace about again, but something needs to happen fairly quickly because anger is building up, in the Chamber, outside and among the WASPI women.

I do not share the view of some hon. Members about the equalisation of pensions. I supported the equalisation of pensions, but not on the basis of the retirement age for women increasing. I thought we were entering a period when we would be reducing the age that men had to work until, so we would equalise pensions that way. The argument then was about whether the economy could afford it. The reason I was trying to equalise pensions by reducing men’s working age was largely for working-class people.

In many of our cities, the difference between the life expectancy of the rich and the poor is something like 20 years. We were told then that life expectancy would be continuously improving, but it has stagnated. Many people do not work in a sedentary role, so as we increase the retirement age—it is now going up to 68 and beyond—they will work until they drop. That is not acceptable, particularly in the economy that we have, where we could redistribute wealth, lower people’s retirement age and give them a decent pension.

I was involved in designing the scheme proposed in 2019. We commissioned Lord Bryn Davies, who is one of the most respected pensions experts in the country, and worked for two years with WASPI and the different groups to design the scheme. My commentary on the proposals by the ombudsman reflects some of the work that was done. We looked at a straightforward scheme. Going into individual cases would take decades, to be frank, so we looked at a flat-rate scheme for everybody, based on an average loss of £100 a week. That resulted in an average payment of £15,000, which is a lot of money. We costed it at more than £50 billion, which seemed a lot of money at the time, but it is less than a third of what the Government saved by increasing the pension age for these women. In addition, we looked at different options: should we pay it over a four or five-year period and reduce the cost to £12 billion a year. When I said during the debate that this was a large amount of money, somebody said that we had just paid out £500 billion to bail out the banks when they had crippled the economy. Then we went into 2020 and covid hit us.

[Grahame Morris]

The hon. Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) made some excellent points, but he asked us how we could fund decent pensions and the requisite compensation. I looked up the figures. As a percentage of GDP, the UK spends 5.7% on state pensions and pensions benefits. In Italy, the figure is 16%. In France, it is 13.9%. In Denmark, it is 10.1%. The OECD average is 8.2%. By any measure, we are miles adrift.

[John McDonnell]

I also looked at what had been provided in tax cuts to some of the wealthiest in our country since 2010. It was £100 billion. I looked at how much had been given in corporate welfare benefits, and, again, it was £100 billion. Therefore, although it sounded like a lot of money at the time, in the context of fairness, it was the right amount. That is why the ombudsman’s offer of between £3,000 and £10,000 is derisory; it has to be more than that. The reason for having a flat-rate compensation scheme is for ease of administration, and I would recommend that wholeheartedly.

We have heard today about the individual hardships that people have endured. We cannot allow that to go on any further, which is why this scheme must be expedited. The ombudsman reports and is accountable to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, on which I serve. We have considered each of the reports as they have come forward. We were critical about the delays that were taking place, so we impressed on the ombudsman the urgency of the situation. When we got the report back, we found that it had at least accepted that there had been an injustice and that there needed to be a compensation scheme. We waited with bated breath for the Secretary of State to announce at least the timescale and the timetable for that compensation scheme, but all we heard was that the Government would go away and consider it. That was weeks ago.

PACAC wrote to the Secretary of State and asked for a timetable, stressing the urgency of the matter, because, exactly as Members have said, people are dying. Some people cannot wait, because they either will literally not be here any more, or they are living in poverty and hardship.

We received a reply this week. The Secretary of State said that he would be bringing forward a statement “in due course”. What that means is nothing; it is meaningless. As a Committee, we have agreed to write again to say that that is unacceptable and that we need a clear timetable in which this matter will be addressed and proposals brought forward that we can vote on and, if necessary, amend in this House.

If this Parliament is sovereign and the Government are accountable to this House, I believe that there is a majority, an overwhelming majority, of Members who will vote for a compensation scheme that is readily accessible, and also at a level that reflects the hardship that people have suffered and the scale that most Members would want to see.

As we go into a general election, the issue will not go away. The WASPI women and their campaign will not go away. People have expressed admiration for that campaign, which is not just impressive; it is terrifying. Unless a proposal is brought forward, it will become an election issue. I think people’s votes will stand or fall in many constituencies on the basis of the decision coming out of all the political parties. Voters will, however, blame the Government the most, because there is an opportunity now, as others have said, to make a statement by the recess with a timetable for implementation. We could almost certainly agree the funding. We looked at how to raise the funds. Some could be borrowing, but the Government normally have contingencies for legal liabilities. This is a legal liability. We have the opportunity to act now, and I urge the Government to wake up and listen to what the whole House is saying. If today’s response is not satisfactory, we will be back next week, and if necessary every day until the recess until we get some sense out of the Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Paul Maynard)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for finding the time to host the debate. We have heard from Members on both sides of the House and from across the whole country, who have spoken both eloquently and passionately on behalf of their constituents. I know that many in the Public Gallery, as well as those listening remotely, who will be taking a close, scrutinising interest in this matter. I am always conscious that it is on behalf of those women that we are deliberating.

I pay tribute to those in my own constituency who have campaigned long and hard and met me down the years, even in recent weeks. I readily acknowledge the strength of feeling on both sides of the House. The Government are listening. What colleagues have had to say during the debate, which I have heard, will be taken fully into consideration.

In the oral statement made to the House on 25 March, the Secretary of State explained that the ombudsman’s report is complex, with the events that it considers spanning about 30 years. He committed to provide an

“update to the House once we have considered the report’s findings.”—[Official Report, 25 March 2024; Vol. 747, c. 1281.]

I understand the wide interest in this matter across the Chamber. We are all united in wanting a resolution. The ombudsman’s investigation has taken five years and produced a substantial report that requires careful and considered scrutiny. It is only right that we should give it that scrutiny. The Government are giving full and proper consideration to the ombudsman’s report, and that work is ongoing. The issues to be decided are significant and complex and require detailed understanding and deliberation.

I would like to remind the House of the Government’s strong track record of supporting pensioners. In 2024-25, we will spend more than £167 billion on benefits for pensioners. That is 6% of GDP and includes spending on the state pension, which is forecast to be about £138 billion in 2024-25. We are honouring the triple lock, having increased the basic and new state pensions by 8.5% in April. In 2024-25, the full yearly amount of the basic state pension will be £3,700 higher in cash terms than it was in 2010. We now have 200,000 fewer pensioners in absolute poverty after housing costs.

[Grahame Morris]

I am grateful to the Minister for sharing those figures. I am aware that people are a bit sceptical about statistics—someone said in the Select Committee the other day that 83.6% of all statistics were made up; I am not sure if that is true. Can I just advise the Minister of this? We have the poorest pensioners in Europe. Just 5.7% of our UK GDP is spent on state pensions and pensions benefits, compared with 16% in Italy, 13.9% in France, 11.9% in Spain, and an OECD average of 8.2%. His suggestion that our pensioners are generously provided for does not stand up to scrutiny.

[Paul Maynard]

I am grateful for that contribution. I heard the hon. Gentleman make those comments in his speech as well. I am trying to remember the precise figures, but I cannot, so I will write to him. More generally—this point is often made to me by pension experts—the international numbers are not directly comparable because each welfare system is entirely different, particularly in the public-private split in how pension systems are funded. To say that one percentage is generous while another percentage is not generous is not quite the point. I shall write to him none the less, because I think that he will find the fine print useful for his future contributions.