Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps his Department is taking to accelerate the review process for war pension application; and whether any changes to internal procedures or decision-making frameworks are being considered to reduce waiting times.

Work is underway to tackle the backlog war pension applications pending action, of which has increased in the last few months. The department continually review and evaluate its processes to look for ways to improve and minimise claim processing times. The caseload is subject to constant review and when necessary, steps are taken to target resources to a particular team or work area to expedite the workflow.

Please refer to the following table for the current number of pending War Pension applications:

The extract numbers held on the specific date of the 11 March each year could not be produced, therefore the data above was taken from 1 March for 2022-2024 and 28 February 2025.