Women’s Changed State Pension Age: Compensation

Warinder Juss Excerpts

Wednesday 15th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Sir John Hayes]

I have been in this place a long time, as the hon. Lady knows, and she is here having first been endorsed by the electorate, then rejected, then re-endorsed. I have not had that difficulty myself; none the less, she will know that one learns and grows in this place. As I became more familiar with these arguments—I repeat this—I challenged the Conservative Government, my own party, on this issue, on the record, on the Floor of the House. It is not about this Minister; this is about any Minister who fails to recognise this matter.

[Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir John Hayes]

If I might make a little progress, then I will happily give way.

It is important to set out some of the detail. Some of the worst-affected women received just 18 months’ notice of a six-year increase in their state pension age. Just under 2 million women fall into that category. The WASPI campaigners acknowledge that some were going to retire only a matter of days, or perhaps weeks, later than expected, whereas those who were given very long notice were clearly in a rather different circumstance. The campaigners are not unrealistic about that. Having met them and discussed it, I know that they are very realistic about the difference between those two groups, and they therefore simultaneously recognise that the Government response needs to be tailored, and measured in the way it gauges the responsibility. The breach in trust is common, but the effect of that breach in trust is different in different cases.

I do not advocate a response to this problem in which every single case is dealt with individually, so that there are as many different settlements as individuals. That would be impractical and delayed, and I emphasise delay because one of these women dies every 12 minutes. There will be another WASPI woman lost during the course of my speech. That is the reality. These bald statistics mask lives—lives altered, lives damaged and lives restricted by this matter.

[Warinder Juss]

rose—

[Sir John Hayes]

That is what inspires me to speak today and, I am sure, inspires the hon. Gentleman, who is about to intervene to say just how much he supports me.

[Warinder Juss]

A lot of us have previously publicly supported the WASPI women, including by posting photographs on social media. The Government have acknowledged that there has been maladministration, but to have that acknowledgement without some kind of financial backing, even if minimal, not only undermines the process of the ombudsman, who so many of us rely on, but may undermine public confidence in politicians in general.

[Sir John Hayes]

The hon. Gentleman is right and he encourages me to turn to the ombudsman’s report, which I have before me. Members will be pleased to note that, although I have inserted many tags into my copy of this report and the previous one, I will not refer to all of them. That would take forever.

Suffice it to say that the ombudsman found

“maladministration in DWP’s communication about the 1995 Pensions Act resulted in complainants losing opportunities to make informed decisions about some things and to do some things differently, and diminished their sense of personal autonomy and financial control.”

The ombudsman’s remedy is set out at the end of the second report. Ombudsmen recommend recompense on a scale—a series of levels, from 1 to 6. The report is here for everyone who has not studied it in detail to see: the ombudsman recommended a level 4 response. That means

“a significant and/or lasting injustice that has, to some extent, affected someone’s ability to live a relatively normal life.”

It suggests that the recompense might be between £1,000 and £2,950.