MPs have renewed pressure on DWP to revisit compensation for women affected by State Pension age changes.Pension Credit – Could you or someone you know be eligible?
Fresh calls have been made for compensation for Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) campaigners after a tense exchange in Parliament. During Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) questions in the Commons on Monday, MPs challenged ministers over their refusal to act on recommendations from the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO).
Liberal Democrat MP James MacCleary pointed out in the PHSO’s final report, published in March 2024, the Ombudsman had recommended compensation for millions of women and said its findings are followed in the vast majority of cases.
He asked Pensions Minister Torsten Bell: “Does the Minister accept that singling out this group by not complying amounts to discrimination on the basis of sex and age? If not, what possible justification can the Minister offer?”
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In response, Mr Bell defended the UK Government’s position, saying it was “unusual but not unprecedented” to take a different view from the Ombudsman.
He told MPs the UK Government had taken the report “incredibly seriously” but had set out its reasons for rejecting compensation in a formal response laid before Parliament earlier this year.
Democratic Unionist Party MP Jim Shannon also pressed ministers, raising concerns about thousands of women who were given little time to adjust their retirement plans.
He said: “How can the Minister justify the decision that no direct financial loss occurred when thousands of women were deprived of the 28-month notice period required to adjust their life savings and retirement plans?”
Mr Bell reiterated the Ombudsman’s findings focused narrowly on how changes were communicated, not the policy itself.
He said it was the Ombudsman that initially concluded women “did not suffer direct financial loss”, adding: “What we are debating in this case is the communications, not the decision itself.”
The SNP’s Seamus Logan accused the UK Government of failing to follow through on previous commitments and questioned what work had been done on a compensation scheme.
The MP for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East also highlighted the last ministerial meeting with WASPI campaigners took place in 2024.
In response, the Pensions Minister said Labour’s election manifesto had made “no commitment” to introduce compensation and repeated that ministers had already set out their position in detail.
DWP has consistently argued while there were failures in communication, this does not justify a blanket payout to an estimated 3.5 million women across the UK.
The WASPI Campaign – along with other groups representing women across the country – has long called for compensation for women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed about changes to their State Pension age.
The Ombudsman previously suggested payouts ranging from £1,000 to £2,950 depending on the level of impact.
However, there is currently no compensation scheme in place, no application process and no timeline for any potential payments.
Monday’s Commons clash shows pressure on ministers is continuing to build, but for now, the UK Government is standing firm against calls to rethink its position.
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