Pensions Uprating (UK Pensioners Living Overseas)

Martin Docherty-Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. This is not just about someone who comes back to the UK to live. Oddly enough, if such individuals came back to the UK for a holiday, they would collect their full UK state pension when they were here. The whole thing is just daft; we need to normalise it and accept our full responsibilities.

Let me give the example of Rita Young. She is 78 and lives in Peterborough, in the UK. She retired in 2002, aged 67, having enjoyed a long career in market research and as a community volunteer. Rita’s son moved to work in Australia some time ago and now has a family there. Since being widowed, Rita has wanted to join her son and grandchildren, but she has felt unable to do so because of the prospect of a frozen pension.

As Rita gets older, she finds daily life increasingly difficult, especially as she does not have a family around her to rely on. She is deeply saddened that she is not able to be with her family during the later stages of her life. She said:

“I have worked and contributed to my state pension all my life. It doesn’t seem fair that the government can just stop uprating it because I want to be with my family.”

That is the human cost of frozen pensions.

Lastly, there is former college lecturer Anne Puckridge, now 91. She lived and worked in the UK all her working life, paying mandatory national insurance contributions throughout. In 2002, aged 77, she finally retired and decided to move to Canada to be with her daughter and grandchildren, who had moved to Calgary. Fourteen years on, Anne, who served as an intelligence officer in the Women’s Royal Naval Service in the second world war, is struggling to live on a frozen pension of £75.50 a week.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the fact that the majority of Commonwealth nations are part of this process where pensions are frozen is a slap in the face for those who served not only this country but the Commonwealth in the second world war and in conflicts after that? In this year, when we have so many commemorations, unfreezing pensions would be a worthwhile exercise and would show that we value the worth of these people.

[Ian Blackford]

Absolutely. We owe a debt of gratitude to these people, and we should recognise that. My hon. Friend talks about the Commonwealth, and the arrangements are not reciprocal, because a Canadian pensioner who moved here would get their full pension. We need to make sure that our pensioners living in Canada are treated in the same way.

Anne feels that she will be forced to move back to the United Kingdom because her pension will no longer cover her day-to-day expenses, and she is increasingly reliant on her daughter to get by. She said:

“It’s the small things, and the injustice, that is really getting to me. I value my independence, but I can’t go on living on the breadline and I don’t want to inflict this on my family. As well as ever-increasing poverty, I feel a sense of stress and shame, which is affecting my health.”

For Abhik, Rita, Anne and all those who are not getting what is rightfully theirs, let this House today send a clear and unequivocal message to the Government that we want all our pensioners, regardless of domicile, to receive what is rightfully theirs: a full state pension. Today we can take the first steps towards fixing this injustice and delivering fairness for all our pensioners.