Winter Fuel Payment

Claire Young Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Torsten Bell]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. We need to make sure that we are seeing child poverty fall and seeing extra help for families through free school meals, as well as through the breakfast clubs that she mentions. We also need to see more progress on pensioner poverty. That is why today we are saying that the threshold will be well above the incomes of pensioners who are in poverty. We do not want to see that poverty in the years ahead, which is exactly why we have made this change today.

[Claire Young (Thornbury and Yate) (LD)]

While the Government buried their heads in the sand, countless pensioners suffered, such as my constituent who, despite having a terminal disease, had to cut back on heating and food, and spent the winter “freezing cold”. Can the Minister explain why no impact assessments were conducted last year before winter fuel payments were stripped from millions of pensioners?

[Torsten Bell]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question, but the equalities analysis was done. Unusually, the poverty impact analysis was also published over the last year. I do not agree with the statement that she has just made, but she is right to say that we need to make sure that we are improving things for pensioners. As I said before, this Government’s priority is to keep raising the state pension and to rescue the NHS. As I said, one in five over-75s are currently on an NHS waiting list, and the funding to make that happen is possible only because of the tax rises that I hear the Liberal Democrats oppose week in, week out.

Women’s Changed State Pension Age: Compensation

Claire Young Excerpts

Monday 17th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Claire Young (Thornbury and Yate) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Cotswolds (Dr Savage) on introducing the debate so powerfully.

WASPI women faced inequalities in the workplace and in finance. Many entered the workforce before the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, which at least in theory introduced equal pay and made it possible for women to get credit cards, loans and other financial products without the support of a man. Statutory maternity pay was not introduced until after many had already had their children, and it was only in 1990 that their income was recognised for taxation purposes as their own, rather than their husband’s.

The principle of an equal pension age is right. The issue is the lack of timely notification, denying WASPI women the chance to plan their finances in an informed way. That is yet another injustice for the WASPI women generation, and it is one that has had real consequences. For example, one of my constituents, born in 1955, found out that her state pension age was increasing to 66 just before her 60th birthday. It was too late to plan any differently, so she ploughed on, but she was forced by leukaemia to retire just before her 65th birthday, leading to financial hardship.

This was also a generation where caring responsibilities overwhelmingly fell to women. That is illustrated by another of my constituents, who was aiming to retire at 60, in part to help to care for her elderly mother. She was denied that opportunity due to the failure to communicate clearly the state pension age changes. As a result, she missed out on being able to care for her dying mother due to needing to work for longer. She told me how she would have welcomed a letter giving her enough notice about the changes, as that may have allowed her to plan her finances further ahead, to allow her more time with her mother. The impact that the changes have had not only on WASPI women themselves, but on their family and loved ones—who these women often care for as they get older—is an often overlooked factor. That concern will only grow as time goes by.

To conclude, there is clear evidence of injustice, and I urge the Government to listen to the ombudsman’s decision and address that injustice as promised.

Women’s State Pension Age Communication: PHSO Report

Claire Young Excerpts

Tuesday 17th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liz Kendall]

We are prepared to take difficult decisions if we think that they are fair and right. That is why we have taken this approach to the issue of how the state pension age increase was communicated between 2004 and 2007. We agree with what the ombudsman says about maladministration, and I have set out our three action points: to make sure we have a clear and detailed action plan to learn all the lessons, to give people sufficient notice in future if their state pension age increases, and to have a detailed programme of communication about the state pension going forward. Those are firm actions to show that we have learned the lessons from this report.

[Claire Young (Thornbury and Yate) (LD)]

I am sure that the 69-year-old who contacted me explaining how she had missed out on being able to care for her dying mother due to needing to work longer would have welcomed a letter giving her enough notice to plan her finances to allow otherwise. What support can the Secretary of State offer WASPI women, who are still disproportionately taking on caring responsibilities?

[Liz Kendall]

The hon. Lady raises a really important point. As we get older, many of us are working while caring for our elderly loved ones or for children—sometimes both—and those family carers need support. I have already set out the action we have taken, including the biggest ever boost to the earnings threshold for carer’s allowance and a serious, independent review of carers’ overpayments, but we can and should be doing more to support family carers. I am very happy to meet the hon. Lady to talk through her ideas that she thinks would benefit her constituents, if she would like.