Women’s State Pension Age: Financial Redress

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Thursday 3rd July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

The hon. Lady is spot on. The women have suffered an injustice, and they have been ignored. They should not have had to fight for so long. The sad fact is that already so many women have died waiting to see justice. What will it take to fix this? Will it take an ITV drama to shine a light on what has happened before everybody gets angry enough to do something about it? I do not know the answer to that, but what I do know is that the facts are clear. Even the ombudsman’s report sets that out, and the Government need to act urgently. The hon. Lady has been a fantastic campaigner in this House over the years. and I am sure the women are truly thankful for her support.

The 1950s Women of Wales propose, in line with CEDAWinLAW, that redress could be an initial lump sum to allow swift financial relief, with additional payments over a five-year period. Even the previous Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee suggested a scheme. He wrote to the then Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to suggest that a rules-based scheme be considered. The letter describes a system where payments are adjusted within a range, based on the ombudsman’s severity of injustice scale, to reflect the extent of change in the individual state pension age and the notice of the change the individual received. It would be quick to administer, he said, and inexpensive compared with a more bespoke scheme. He further suggested that there should also be flexibility for individuals to make a case for additional compensation for direct loss. And that Select Committee Chair is now a Minister in the Department for Work and Pensions! Who knew? Perhaps the Minister could sit down and have a cup of tea with himself to discuss the plans he had before he entered office.

Any scheme must be responsible and financially sustainable, so let us have a look at some options on that, too.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. Before Mr Shannon intervenes, may I respectfully ask the hon. Lady to consider truncating her speech a little, as a number of colleagues will want to speak this afternoon?

[Jim Shannon]

There are 77,000 WASPI women in Northern Ireland, 7,000 of them in Strangford. Does the hon. Lady appreciate their palpable anger about how they have been mistreated and about the injustice that they wish to see addressed? On behalf of those 7,000 constituents of mine, I seek the same thing as the hon. Lady and all of us in this Chamber today.

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

The hon. Gentleman is a powerful advocate for women in Northern Ireland. He is right: what has happened is wrong, plain and simple. We need to see action today. I promise I am coming to the end, Madam Deputy Speaker—I do not want to try your patience.

There are options to make sure that schemes are financially sustainable. WASPI has calculated that HM Treasury has saved a whopping £181 billion by increasing the state pension age alone. Other options include applying a 1% to 2% wealth tax on assets over £10 million, which would raise up to £22 billion a year, or equalising capital gains tax with income tax rates, which would raise £15.2 billion a year. Applying national insurance to investment income would raise £8.6 billion a year. Ending stealth subsidies on banks could raise up to £55 billion over the next five years—something even Gordon Brown has advocated.

Cost does not need to be, and should not be, a barrier to justice. In January the Deputy Ombudsman told the Work and Pensions Committee that the DWP at the time knew that the women did not know, and that they failed to act. He said:

“if you accept this maladministration and you accept people were affected by that maladministration, there is a conversation about how you factor cost into the need to do justice.”

The trauma, hardship, poverty and sheer stress that these women have been put through for a decade must make justice for them a matter of urgency.

I have a lot of time for the Minister. I call on him to get round the table with these women and to listen to them. I ask him to listen to the evidence, put considerations of financial redress for 1950s-born women who have suffered back on the table and allow full and adequate parliamentary scrutiny for any proposal, as the ombudsman intended.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is a real pleasure to speak in this debate. First, I thank the hon. Member for Salford (Rebecca Long Bailey) for setting the scene so incredibly well and all the hon. and right hon. Members who have contributed fantastically, putting across the demands of their constituents.

This is not a new issue, and we know that. I do not think I have missed a WASPI debate. Indeed, I do not think the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) has missed one either in the time I have been here. This week in this House has given me hope that perhaps the Government can acknowledge when we are moving in the wrong direction. The Government need to correct the wrong steps taken and follow through on the recommendations in the ombudsman’s report.

Northern Ireland has some 77,000 WASPI women, of whom 7,000 are my constituents. I do not know all 7,000 personally—I have not done that roll-call—but those who have come to me have told me their stories. In many cases, they are ladies who have cleaned floors or cleaned offices or been classroom assistants or teachers. Age catches up with us all, and it catches up with me, too. It catches up with them, and their knees are not as strong as they used to be. They planned their pensions in accordance with the timescale, and then it was taken away from them. That is the concern I have. They had planned for their life, and then they were deprived of that.

The report rightly found that some WASPI women were not informed about the changes to their pensions and had made long-term financial plans based on the assumption that they would receive their state pension at 60. All their financial planning was in place, and then it was just taken away. That meant that when the WASPI women lost their pensions, they lost all sources of income and met unexpected financial insecurity. The insufficient information was not only negligent, but deeply unjust, and the Government have acknowledged that to be the case, so there is a precedent. The hon. Member for Lewes (James MacCleary) was right to say that the process was backed away from.

Women who spent decades raising families, paying taxes and contributing to the economy were left without recognition for their hard work. Many WASPI women were forced back into the workforce, often with disabilities and often into low-paying jobs, or had no choice but to apply for benefits. Those women should never have had to do that after a lifetime contributing to the system.

A number of these women—I call them the silent generation—still face significant outstanding debts and loans that they will struggle to pay off for the rest of their lives due to the inability to manage their income appropriately. When they realised that they could not access their pensions, their ability to go back to full-time hours was not simple, and the emotional toll has been significant, too. Many WASPI women now experience stress and depression brought about by financial uncertainty. It is only fair that the hard and consistent work done by these ladies is financially recognised.

I say this with respect to the Minister, but one of the first steps that this Government took was to sort out the back pay of union workers. I am not saying they should not have done that, but if there is to be fairness in this system, I cannot for the life of me understand how they can do that in one breath, and then in the next apologise to the WASPI women but not do right by them.

The silent generation are determined to be silent no longer. I applaud them for going against the grain, as we often say at home, by continuing to complain. I applaud them for continuing to speak, when many of them have been told to be quiet and give it up. I applaud them for continuing to hold Governments—this one and the last one—to account. I applaud them for standing beside the weary and the worn, and for demanding compensation for all affected.

Apologising is not enough. As the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) said, it is not about words any more. It is about action, and now is the time.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I refuse to believe that age is catching up with the hon. Gentleman. I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.