Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many wives of deceased servicemen have been awarded discretionary pension payments despite not qualifying under the rules of the Armed Forces Pension Scheme in each of the last five years.

The Armed Forces Pension Scheme's rules are enshrined in legislation. Therefore, no discretionary pension payments can be made to an individual unless all eligibility criteria are met.

Delegated authority from the Defence Council does allow for consideration of cases in view of making a Discretionary Widows award. However, there are five strict qualifying criteria, and the widow must meet all five in order receive such a payment.

A central record of applications for a discretionary award is not kept. However, following a recent Freedom of Information Request a physical search of 144 widows-related enquiries received since 30 June 2022 identified eight cases where an application was made. Of these cases, seven met all the qualifying criteria and were accepted for a discretionary award. The one case that was rejected for the discretionary award failed to meet the full qualifying criteria.

To identify every application during the previous five years would incur disproportionate cost.