Women’s pension campaign
BATTLE AGAINST CHANGES WHICH COULD COST £45,000 PER PERSON BACKED BY NORTH EAST MP
More than 49,000 people have added their voice to a campaign calling for a rethink on pension deals which have left older women out of pocket.
Easington MP Grahame Morris has set up the online petition via the Parliament site, urging the Government to bring in a non-means tested bridging pension for those affected “without delay”.
A change in the 1995 State Pensions Act included an increase in pension age from 60 to 65 so it equalled men, with the Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) appeal agreeing with that move, but not the “unfair way” the changes were implemented.
They are angry at being treated unfairly because of the day they were born and because the significant changes to the age they receive their state pension have been imposed with a lack of notification, with little or no notice and faster than they were promised, which meant they could not plan ahead.
The issue impacts on hundreds and thousands of women born after April 6, 1950, and puts them at risk of losing up to around £45,000 from their pension pot.
Mr Morris’s petition backs the Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) appeal.
The appeal will be debated in Parliament, should it hit the 100,000 names required.
It comes as the Labour Party announced it would allow women born in the 1950s to retire at 64 on a reduced state pension, rather than having to wait until 66.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Debbie Abrahams made the announcement at the party’s conference in Brighton.
Mr Morris has previously tabled am Early Day Motion supported by 192 MPs, including one Conservative member as well as several Scottish National Party, Democratic Unionist Party, Liberal Democrats and Plaid Cymru members.
Mr Morris said: “I set this up because last term there was a debate in Westminister to highlight the injustice of the Waspi women.
“There are 4,000 women affected in this constituency of Easington and there are similarnumbersinmostconstituencies who are adversely affected by the changes in their pensions, expecting to get them at 60 and then finding out they have to work until they are 66.
“Some are having to sell their homes, some are having to use the savings they hoped would see them through until their old age and some just don’t have savings because they were low paid.
“These are people who have not been idle, they have worked from the age of 16 or 17, worked for 45 years and paid in their National Insurance contributions and now they feel like they are being robbed of their pensions.
“They signed a contract with the Government when they started work to pay in those NI contributions.”
The petition can be signed via https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/200088