Hartlepool WASPI campaigners cheer outcome of judicial review into pension injustice

The Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) national campaign group is fighting for justice for women born in the 1950s who have been left financially worse off by changes to raise their State Pension Age from 60 to 66 in line with men.

The timings of the changes and way women affected were informed meant many did not have time to make plans for their new pension age.

In July 2021 the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman found that the Department of Work and Pensions was was guilty of maladministration when it failed to inform women affected by the changes in a timely manner.

A mailing campaign began in April 2009 but the ombudsman said it should have started no later than December 2006.

Earlier this year WASPI campaigners raised money to launch a judicial review after rejecting the ombudsman’s assessment of the scale of the injustice, meaning many women may not have been in line for compensation.

Lawyers for the campaigners argued he ignored three ‘pauses’ in the DWP’s letter-writing campaign.

The ombudsman has now accepted his approach to the second stage of his report was “legally flawed”, and has agreed to reconsider his key findings.

It has been welcomed by the coordinators of the Hartlepool WASPI (Women Against State Pension Injustice) Supporters Group which has over 500 members.

Barbara Crossman and Lynne Taylor said: “We are over the moon that it is being looked at and we just hope that it’s going to come to a quick conclusion.

"It has been six years since Hartlepool WASPI started.”

They added: “We didn’t agree with the amount of time the ombudsman said the maladministration took place.

“WASPI have never asked for the pension age to go back to 60. All we are asking for is a bridging pension to get us from 60 to 66.”

More than 5,000 women in Hartlepool are said to have been affected by the pension changes.

Barbara also raised the issue with Labour leader Keir Starmer when he visited Hartlepool last week.

She said he was non committal over whether the issue would feature in Labour’s manifesto.