War Widows: Ex Gratia Pension Payment

Baroness Smith of Newnham Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the tireless campaigning that my noble friend has done on behalf of war widows. I appreciate that this is difficult, but the eligibility criteria were discussed with the War Widows’ Association from the inception of the scheme. I have been assured by officials from the Ministry of Defence that at no point have the eligibility criteria changed.

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord the Minister may think that war widows and others spend their lives watching parliamentlive.tv; I suspect that most do not. I seem to recall that, last time this issue came up, I asked whether His Majesty’s Government could inform everybody who they thought was eligible about eligibility, not request people to go online. What are His Majesty’s Government doing to ensure that they do the right thing by all of these widows, including ensuring eligibility as they expected it to be?

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for that question. We do need people to apply because, in line with legislation, once an individual is no longer in receipt of payments from the MoD, the MoD will not update its records on an ongoing basis. Therefore, crucial information such as their address, bank details and surname may not be current. The information requested on the application will enable the MoD to cross-check with the records that it holds and verify an applicant’s eligibility.