Thousands of UK women owed pension payout after ombudsman’s Waspi ruling

Way state pension age was raised plunged retirement plans into chaos, but DWP has indicated it won’t pay compensation



Thousands of women, potentially hundreds of thousands, are owed compensation because of government failings related to the way changes to the state pension age were made, a long-awaited official report has said.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) said those affected should be compensated. But the recommended payouts of between £1,000 and £2,950 a person fall far short of the £10,000-plus that campaigners were calling for.

Depending on the numbers affected, the total bill could still end up being in the billions of pounds – more than £10bn if all women born in the 1950s were compensated. However, the ombudsman cannot compel the government to pay compensation, and said the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had clearly indicated it would “refuse to comply”, which was “unacceptable”.

As a result, the PHSO said it was “taking the rare but necessary step of asking parliament to intervene”.

The prime minister’s spokesperson indicated Downing Street would be taking time to consider the report, but declined to say whether compensation would be paid by the government, or whether an apology would be issued.

Campaigners claim that almost 4 million women born in the 1950s had their retirement plans “plunged into chaos”, with many thousands of pounds out of pocket after the DWP increased the state pension age from 60 to 65, and then to 66. Some say they received only 12 months’ notice of a six-year delay to their pension.

The ombudsman has been investigating the matter for several years, and in an initial report in July 2021 it found the DWP guilty of maladministration in the handling of the changes.

On Thursday, the PHSO issued its final report, which said “thousands of women may have been affected by DWP’s failure to adequately inform them that the state pension age had changed”.

It added that the department’s handling of the changes “meant some women lost opportunities to make informed decisions about their finances. It diminished their sense of personal autonomy and financial control.”

Campaigners for the Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group, which formed in 2015, had called for the ombudsman to recommend the highest possible amount of compensation (£10,000 or more).

However, the report said that looking at the sample of complainants’ cases, it would recommend compensation of between £1,000 and £2,950 to reflect a “significant and/or lasting injustice that has, to some extent, affected someone’s ability to live a relatively normal life”.

The total number of women who could in theory be due compensation is unclear. The report said compensating all 3.5 million-plus women born in the 1950s at its recommended payout level would cost between £3.5bn to £10.5bn in public funds, but it added: “We understand not all of them will have suffered injustice.”

The report went on to say: “There will likely be a significant number of women born in the 1950s who have … suffered injustice because of maladministration in DWP’s communication about the 1995 Pensions Act. We would have recommended DWP remedy their injustice.”

Many women say they had expected to receive their pension at 60, then discovered their state pension age had increased by perhaps four, five or even six years. The government did not write to any of the women affected until almost 14 years after the law was passed.

Waspi has said hundreds of thousands of women did not have enough time to make alternative plans, and that some had had to sell their homes, go without essentials or rely on their elderly parents because of the way the changes were made and communicated. Some have claimed the changes would leave them tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket.

One sample complainant, “Ms U”, told the ombudsman she had suffered a financial loss of £39,000, “being the amount I would expect to receive from my perceived [state pension age] to my actual [state pension age]”.

“Ms W”, meanwhile, said she had lost about £45,000 because of reaching state pension age six years later than she had expected.

Others mentioned even bigger sums. “Ms E” reported losing about £186,000 in work she would have found had she been told about the age increase, while “Ms W” said she lost more than £442,000 in additional pay she would have earned had she stayed in her job.

However, the ombudsman said: “We do not consider these losses could amount to direct financial loss in accordance with our guidance since they result from different choices Ms E and Ms W would or might have made if they had known their state pension age sooner.”

Angela Madden, the chair of Waspi, said: “The DWP’s refusal to accept the clear conclusions of this five-year-long investigation is simply unbelievable. One of the affected women is dying every 13 minutes, and we just cannot afford to wait any longer.”

She added that all political parties “owe it to the women affected to make a clear and unambiguous commitment to compensation. The ombudsman has put the ball firmly in parliament’s court, and it is now for MPs to do justice to all the 3.6million women affected.”

A DWP spokesperson said: “We will consider the ombudsman’s report and respond in due course, having cooperated fully throughout this investigation.”

They added: “The government has always been committed to supporting all pensioners in a sustainable way that gives them a dignified retirement while also being fair to them and taxpayers.”

Hundreds of thousands of men AND women on low incomes also lost their entitlement to Pension Credit and other benefits at the same time due to the same rule. Many were made homeless or destitute as a result. Some will have died prematurely.

The amount of compensation being suggested - even if it is ever paid - is laughable. I lost £6,000 of Housing Benefit alone.

Labour denies 3.8 million Waspi women compensation



Labour has backtracked on its promises to support the Waspi women by denying them compensation over changes to the state pension.

Liz Kendall, the Work and Pensions Secretary, was accused of hypocrisy after she told MPs that there would be no payouts for the nearly four million women because the Government had given them ample warning of the rise in pension age.

When in opposition, Ms Kendall said she supported the group’s campaign and vowed to “identify and deliver a fair solution”. Sir Keir Starmer, as Labour leader, signed a pledge in 2022 that called for “fair and fast compensation” for Waspi women.

The Waspi – Women Against State Pension Inequality – campaign claims 3.8 million women born in the 1950s were not made aware of the age change, throwing their retirement plans into chaos.

Labour’s 2019 manifesto also promised compensation for the affected women. However, the party rejected calls from the parliamentary ombudsman to pay victims up to £2,950 each because they had failed to communicate the reforms properly, at a cost of £10.5 billion. The government was advised to do so in March.

Angela Madden, who chairs the campaign, said: “This is a bizarre and totally unjustified move, which will leave everyone asking what the point of an ombudsman is if ministers can simply ignore their decisions.”

Announcing the U-turn in the Commons, Ms Kendall said she was rejecting the ombudsman’s recommendation on the basis that most women affected knew that the age was changing.

As a backbench MP in 2019, Ms Kendall posted a series of photographs of herself supporting the Waspi campaign. In one, she holds a placard that reads: “I will work with Waspi to identify and deliver a fair solution for all women affected.”



She commented at the time: “Waspi is a campaign group representative of 3.8 million women born in the 1950s who have been adversely affected by the mismanagement of increases to their state pension age… This injustice can’t go on.”

Labour’s 2019 manifesto under Jeremy Corbyn – on which Ms Kendall was elected – offered Waspi women up to £31,300 in compensation at a cost of £58 billion.

As a backbench MP in 2019, Ms Kendall posted a series of photographs of herself supporting the Waspi campaign. In one, she holds a placard that reads: “I will work with Waspi to identify and deliver a fair solution for all women affected.”

She commented at the time: “Waspi is a campaign group representative of 3.8 million women born in the 1950s who have been adversely affected by the mismanagement of increases to their state pension age… This injustice can’t go on.”

Labour’s 2019 manifesto under Jeremy Corbyn – on which Ms Kendall was elected – offered Waspi women up to £31,300 in compensation at a cost of £58 billion.

In 2022, Sir Keir was photographed with a Waspi pledge sign reading: “I support fair and fast compensation for 1950s women.”



Sharon Graham, the general secretary of the Unite union, said: “The Government’s decision not to compensate the Waspi women despite the ombudsmen’s recommendations is a disgrace. Ministers are making the wrong choices – they need to turn back now, because voters will not forgive them.”

Caroline Abrahams, the charity director of Age UK, said: “Everyone understands that the public finances are under acute pressure, but the Government should not rub salt in the wounds of those impacted by suggesting there is no case for compensation.

“The fact that many of the women affected will also be coping with the loss of their winter fuel payment this year will intensify their sense of injustice.”

Chancellor Rachel Reeves campaigned alongside her mother for Waspi compensation while shadow pensions minister



The chancellor campaigned for Waspi women to receive compensation when she was shadow pensions minister - and revealed that her own mother was affected by changes to the pension age.

Rachel Reeves spoke in a Westminster Hall debate in 2016 in which she said the women hit by the increase to the state pension age from 60 to 65 in the 2010s had been "done an injustice".

The Leeds West MP even proposed her own solution to the issue, arguing in favour of restoring the qualifying age for pension credit to the 2011 timetable for women's state pension age, "thus providing at least some buffer for those who are least able to cope financially with this unfair move".

In the 2016 debate, Ms Reeves said she "absolutely" agreed with a fellow MP who said their constituents were "not told at all by any letter this was going to happen to them" and that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had been "negligent".

The current chancellor said millions of women had been hit twice by changes to the state pension age in 1995 and again in 2011.

She said in the debate that she had campaigned alongside her mother and a number of unions on the issue - and urged the government to "think again".

She said: "In 2011, as shadow pensions minister, I was proud to work with Age UK, USDAW--the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers -and many women, including my mother, in calling on the government to think again.

"We were pleased then that we won a partial concession so that no woman would have to wait for more than an additional 18 months before they could claim their pension.

"However, I said then, and say again today, that that does not go far enough in righting this wrong. There are still 2.6 million women who have lost out as a result of the government rewriting the rules, and 300,000 will have to wait an extra 18 months before they can retire."

She added: "Friends have mentioned - women earning little more than the minimum wage who are often struggling to work full time because of their caring responsibilities, and who are desperately trying to conserve what savings they have to ensure at least a minimal standard of living during their retirement - are very worried.

"For those women, moving the goalposts for the second time, as the government have done, can have a devastating impact on their finances, families and life plans."