A decision not to award compensation to the Waspi women will be reconsidered by the government because of undisclosed “evidence”, the Work and Pensions Secretary has said.
Waspi women – Women Against State Pensions Inequality – are those born in the 1950s who say they were not given sufficient warning of the state pension age for women being lifted – to be in line with men – from 60 to 65.
Politics Live: Who are the Waspi women and what happened to them?
They have long argued that this was done too quickly, leaving some women financially unprepared to cope with the number of years when they were no longer able to claim their state pension.
The government said in December that they would not be compensated, because most women knew the changes were coming.
But Pat McFadden told the Commons on Tuesday: “Since then, as part of the legal proceedings challenging the government’s decision, evidence has been cited about research findings from a 2007 report.”
The cabinet minister was referring to the rediscovery of a 2007 Department for Work and Pensions evaluation which had led to officials stopping sending automatic pension forecast letters out.
Mr McFadden said: “In light of this, and in the interest of fairness and transparency, I have concluded that the government should now consider this evidence. This means we will retake the decision made last December as it relates to the communications on State Pension age.”
Around 3.6 million women were impacted by the change to the state pension age. The government has previously said compensating them could cost £10.5bn.
Mr McFadden stressed that reviewing the decision should not be taken as an indication that the government will “decide that it should award financial redress”.
Angela Madden, the chair of Waspi, said the decision was a “major step forward”.
“The government now knows it got it wrong, and we are pleased they are now trying to do it properly,” she said.
“The only correct thing to do is to immediately compensate the 3.6 million Waspi women who have already waited too long for justice.”
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The decision to refuse compensation was made despite a recommendation by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) that the women should be paid up to £2,950 each.
The PHSO’s findings are not binding, and last year the then-work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall said that the cost could not be justified as most women knew about the changes.
Sir Keir Starmer also said compensation would “burden” the taxpayer.
