Women set for rally to protest over state pension changes
IT WILL be the biggest rally to date involving women who say changes to their state pensions have left them in serious financial trouble.
Today at 12.30pm hundreds of women will meet outside the National Assembly in Cardiff Bay.
Changes were brought in by Westminster which mean women are getting their pensions later.
Any woman born on or after April 6, 1951, has seen changes to her pension and 200,000 women in
TRUE STORIES OF HARDSHIP AND ‘STOLEN RETIREMENT YEARS’
A BOOK of the stories of the women affected has been produced by campaigners. Here are some of the stories of Welsh women:
Jane Roberts was born November 7, 1954
She was first told about the changes to her pension less than two years before she expected to get it.
Then, she was told her pension would not be given to her until she was 66.
She thinks she will have lost £48,000.
“I received a letter telling me that I would not get my pension until I was 66 years old.
“I can’t tell you how angry and upset I was and still am as I had planned for my retirement for some time. In fact, everything that I had done over the previous few years was working towards my retirement at 60.
“Not only did they tell me that I had had six years added, but they had also moved the goalposts with years paid in, up from 30 to 35 years.
“I had been seriously ill in my mid-forties with cancer, having had several operations, and it was several years before I was well enough to work again.
“They changed the goalposts without notice and I am unable to make up the shortfall at my age to claim the so-called new pension.
“No time to make any arrangements for any of these changes and it has left my finances in complete disarray, so much so that eventually I will become reliant on the state at some time in the near future, and that would not have been the case if they had left things alone.
“I was working up until November 2017, when I was made redundant just on my 63rd birthday, although my CV reads like a book with years of experience and retraining certifications over the years to keep Wales are affected.
In 1995, plans to increase the state pension age for women were put forward.
Those plans said the state pension age for women would rise to 65 slowly between April 2010 and April 2020.
Then in 2011 the coalition government announced that the timetable up with technology allowing me to continue in the workplace.
“I have no chance of securing a job that those qualifications should allow me to do, we are not wanted in our 60s in the office that is mainly filled with young vibrant people.
“North Wales is not an industrial area and jobs are not as easy to find as those perhaps in a city. You can imagine how many people apply for each job and you know as soon as you sit down at an interview they have already decided we are too old.
“It is an utter insult to even suggest apprenticeships for anyone in their 60s, indeed, it is hard enough for the young to get these, and when I asked at the job centre as a matter of interest they know nothing about this for the over-60s anyway, and smile sweetly at the poor old dear that asked that daft question.
“I should sign on for JSA but to be honest I can’t cope with all the rubbish and the hoops that you have to jump through just to get £73 or whatever it is now a week.
“I am luckier than a lot of those caught up in this fiasco. I have a little saved, but it will not fund the three years that I need to survive without a would be sped up, with women’s state pension age rising to 65 by November 2018.
By October 2020, men’s and women’s pension age would rise to reach 66 by October 2020.
Campaigners say the changes are unfair and that they have meant women having to work up to six years longer, having to remortgage their homes or in some cases even losing their homes.
The group say they do not oppose equality with men’s pension rights, pension.
“I did everything that I should have done to look after myself and my family. I have never been a drain on anybody. Now I am asking myself ‘why on earth did I do all of that?’ I might as well have enjoyed myself and spent every penny along the way instead of being the responsible person I am.
“I am tired now, I have worked since I was 15 years old and I deserve to retire at the age I was promised, at 60.
“The pension is not a benefit so stop trying to make us all feel like we are claiming something that we do not have a right to.”
‘TB’ wrote on behalf of her cousin
“My cousin, Lesley, had a tough life.
“Lost her dad very young, only child, married, had two children, divorced, found love again, he was killed in a car crash, struggled with the loss, found another partner, who played away, then another, who beat her to near death.
“She finally found peace in Wales, looked forward to receiving her pension and seeing out her days in but say they were not given enough, or in some cases, any notice, to plan.
The most high-profile group is the Waspi group, who have been lobbying for compensation, and today’s event is open to all campaign groups who are battling on behalf of the 1950s women.
On March 8 – International Women’s Day – there was an event where women marched down Queen Street.
Today’s event will also include politicians and supporters. relative peace.
“Two months after her pension was finally paid she died.”
‘S’ was born on March 16, 1954.
She started full-time work with Littlewoods Pools before working in a cigar factory for seven years.
In March 1977 she left work to have her first daughter and in the next four years had two more daughters.
She worked part-time as a school cleaner, in a bakery as needed.
In 1985 she became a cook, working for 15 years, but had to leave after an injury made worse by lifting heavy saucepans.
She took a job in Tesco, working on the checkouts.
“After 17 years I am still there, did not know that I would have to work until 65 and six months, nobody knew, did not receive any letters or info on this.
“I am really upset and feeling let down with all the government.
“After I found out, thinking I would retire at 62-ish, they then changed the goalpost to 65 and six months.
“I understand that we have to change things but it’s too drastic, women just two years older than me get to retire at 60, women one year older than me get to retire at 61-ish.
“When I worked in school meals at Cardiff council I was not offered a pension until about three years before I left in 1997.
“All these years of not being offered a pension, even when I first started work at 15 full time, there was no baby care in those days, also we did not earn a decent wage.
“I feel really let down, also I childmind for a grandson and care for my ageing mum.
“I looked after Mum and Dad-inlaw before they went into a care home.
“I feel as if the government has stolen five and a half years of my retirement and income, feel so let down.”
‘L’ was born on St David’s Day, 1954
“Born in the beginning of March 1954, and being Welsh, being born on your national day kind of made you feel special growing up in the 1950s.
“I mean, you had the Eisteddfod and a half a day off school.”
She left school at 16 and married at 17, having her first son just before her 18th birthday.
“When he was a few months old I started working part-time in a hospital.
“As soon as I was able I paid the full insurance stamp because I wanted my own pension when I retired at 60 years of age.
“No mention was ever made about contributing to a personal pension.”
She worked part-time for three and a half years.
Her marriage later broke down. “I started claiming social security benefits.
“Had to have an interview and was told that while I was claiming benefits my NI stamp was being credited to my account so that I would be accruing credits towards my pension when I was 60.
“While my children were young I found part-time work in a cafe, cleaning, babysitting, anything that enabled me to be at home when the