Women disadvantaged by state pension changes need transitional protection, campaigners say

Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) is petitioning the government to introduce "fair transitional arrangements" for women who were not made aware that their SPA had been pushed back by as much as six years. Campaigners claim that the government did not write to those women whose SPA was increased from 60 to 65 as a result of the pension age equalisation reforms introduced by the 1995 Pensions Act, while a further increase to age 66 due in 2026 will take place "faster than promised".

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said that there were "no plans" to alter SPA arrangements for the subjects of the petition. It said that all women affected had been "directly contacted" to inform them of the changes.

"The policy decision to increase women's State Pension age is designed to remove the inequality between men and women," the DWP said in an official response, published to the government's petitions website. "The cost of prolonging this inequality would be several billions of pounds."

"Parliament extensively debated the issue and listened to all arguments both for and against the acceleration of the timetable to remove this inequality. The decision was approved by parliament in 2011 and there is no new evidence to consider," it said.

The SPA for women in the UK is due to rise from 60 to 65 to match that of men from 2018, before it increases to 66 for both sexes in October 2020 and to 67 by 2028. The government plans to carry out a review of the SPA every five years to ensure that the system remains sustainable given changes in life expectancy, with the first review due to conclude by May 2017.

The government said that this review would consider the impact of the SPA change on women "amongst a number of other factors" in its response to the WASPI petition.

The 1995 Pensions Act introduced 'staggered' increases to the SPA for women, which would have reached 65 by 2020. However the 2011 Pensions Act, passed by the previous coalition government, accelerated the planned changes to achieve equalisation by 2018. The 2011 Act introduced some transitional protection by capping the maximum increase under the new timetable at 18 months, rather than two years.

WASPI said that while it agreed with equalisation, the way that the changes had been introduced left many women with "no time to make alternative plans". According to the DWP's response, the government did not write personally to women affected by the 1995 Act until between April 2009 and March 2011. It wrote to those affected by the 2011 changes between January 2012 and November 2013.

The government also published information about the changes on its website as well as building it into the State Pension statement IT system, introduced in 2001, it said.

"Therefore, statements produced on request using this system would have included women's new State Pension ages as determined by the 1995 Pensions Act," it said.

Pensions expert Alastair Meeks of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com, said that it was becoming increasingly difficult for governments to pass "changes to the law that save money by reducing benefits".

"Things are getting harder now that action groups are being established to revisit decisions taken decades previously and plastered across the face of the statute books," he said.

"It is unfortunate if some people affected had not heard of the changes and how they affected them. It is difficult, however, to see how the matter can be remedied to the satisfaction of the women concerned," he said.