Campaigners for The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group have threatened the government with legal action unless it reverses its decision not to compensate millions of women affected by an increase in state pension age.
The Waspi group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes to the state pension age, first introduced in the 1990s. Last year, the parliamentary ombudsman recommended payouts of up to £2,950 each because of a 28-month delay in writing to inform the women affected of the changes.
However in December, Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall said there was “considerable awareness” of the changes to the pension age. Kendall added that sending letters earlier would not have made a difference to their ability to make retirement choices.
Additionally, the government apologised but told the BBC it “cannot justify paying for a £10.5bn compensation scheme at the expense of the taxpayer”.
Waspi chair Angela Madden said: “We believe this is not only an outrage but legally wrong.” Campaigners have consistently claimed women suffered financial hardship and had to rethink retirement plans as result of a delay in receiving information about the changes.
A “letter before action” has been sent to the government, allowing it a chance to respond before the campaigners seek a judicial review at the High Court in two weeks’ time. If the Waspi group get approval, it means the Work and Pensions Secretary’s claim that there was no direct financial loss could now be examined in court.
Ms Madden said: “The government has accepted that 1950s-born women are victims of maladministration, but it now says none of us suffered any injustice.”
With no compensation forthcoming, she said: “The alternative is continued defence of the indefensible but this time in front of a judge.”
The changes were first decided in 1995 when the then-Conservative government sought to equalise the age at which men and women received their state pensions. To reduce the overall cost of the state pension, following the aftermath of the global financial crisis in 2010, the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition decided to speed up the changes.
However, the UK government did not communicate its change quickly enough and now the impact could be examined in court. Since 2023, the campaigners have been crowdfunding to try and cover their legal fees, the group has currently raised £162,480.
After the ombudsman’s report came out, the campaigners wrote on their crowdfunding page that the report “is not perfect” and “Level 4 compensation is simply too low; and the finding of no direct financial loss is based on a wholly new, unprecedented and inappropriate approach.”
Now, the group writes: “The only way forward now is to ask the High Court for a Judicial Review of the second report. If the Court agrees with us and our legal team that the Ombudsman has made errors, his decisions on the injustice WASPI women suffered will have to be made again, lawfully.
“The only way we can challenge the Ombudsman’s decision is by a Judicial Review. Legal action of this kind is not cheap – we need to protect ourselves against the risk of having to pay the Ombudsman’s costs as well as paying our own lawyers. We will be challenging a public authority with much greater resources than any of us have individually.”
If the campaigners were to win their case, it is estimated it could cost the government as much as £10.5bn. However, with weak economic growth and higher borrowing costs, the Prime Minister has said “the taxpayer simply can’t afford the burden” of compensation.