The Government has refused for a second time to compensate Waspi women over failures to properly communicate a rise in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) campaign has been pushing for payments for 3.6 million women who expected their state pension at 60, but were forced to wait another five or six years.
Labour announced at the end of last year that it would “retake” the initial decision to reject a watchdog’s recommendation to provide compensation to the 1950s-born cohort.
The Government said in November that it had failed to consider Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) research on pension letters when making the initial decision.
However, Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden said on Thursday that he had “come to the same conclusion” as his predecessor Liz Kendall.
Compensation bill would be £10.3bn
McFadden said a flat-rate compensation scheme would cost up to £10.3bn pounds “and would simply not be right or fair, given it would be paid to the vast majority [of women] that were aware of the [state pension age] changes”.
He added: “In taking this new decision, the Government has come to the same conclusion on compensation as my right honourable friend the previous Secretary of State announced in December 2024.”
A 2024 report by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) found the DWP guilty of “maladministration” for failing to properly notify women of the changes to the state pension age.
The watchdog recommended up to £2,950 for each Waspi woman – with the compensation bill potentially amounting to more than £10bn.
But the Labour Government rejected the plan in December 2024. Kendall, the then-Work and Pensions Secretary, said it would not be a “fair or proportionate” use of taxpayers’ money.
Compensation for affected women ‘not practical’, says minister
The Waspi campaign group filed a judicial review case with the High Court last year to try to force the Government into a U-turn.
The legal case was expected to be heard in December but was delayed until ministers had a chance to “retake” the decision.
McFadden said that the Government’s failure to consider the 2007 DWP research findings – which evaluated the effectiveness of pension forecast letters – had come to light as part of the legal battle with Waspi campaigners.
The minister said the letters about the state pension age rise “could have been sent earlier” to 1950s-born women. “I am sorry that those letters were not sent sooner.”
However, McFadden said earlier letters were “unlikely” to have made a difference to what the majority of women knew about the state pension age hike.
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He said setting up a scheme to compensate only the women who did not know the pension age was rising “would not be practical”, and a wider scheme for all 1950s-born women would not be “right or fair”.
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