Tonight I have written a story for Byline Times disclosing that lawyers have decided to seek permission to appeal the Judicial review which rejected all the discrimination claims for the 1950s born women who face a six year delay in getting their pension. The story is here.
BackTo60 have also launched a £72,000 crowdfunding site to raise money for this action. The crowdfunder site is here. Already at time of writing it has raised over £10,000.
The Department for Work and Pensions has produced statistics to frighten the public into believing that compensating 3.8 million women born in the 1950s who lost out through the rise in the pension age from 60 to 66 will cost more than double the real price.
A new DWP research report issued a day after judicial review hearing on June 5 and 6 and given widespread coverage in mainstream media put the cost at an eye watering £188 billion and £212 billion instead of a previous figure of £77.2 billion. The directly comparable figure hidden in a footnote is £91.1 billion at today’s prices.
The full story including how the DWP really knows that 50s women are badly off is in BylineTimes here. https://bylinetimes.com/2019/06/20/project-fear-how-the-dwp-is-trying-to-mislead-the-public-over-the-backto60-pension-costs/
Home secretary Amber Rudd- most high profile Tory who could be unseated by angry people who have lost their pension for up to six years Pic credit: BBC
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Many angry 50s women frustrated they can’t get a pension for up to six years – have the power at the ballot box to knock out the MPs who voted for the change. Since the next general election will be closely fought and many seats have narrow majorities they are literally – no pun intended -in poll position to effect change.
There isn’t a constituency in the United Kingdom that has less than 3000 of these pensioners according to a breakdown helpfully provided by the House of Commons library.
And it is the current Theresa May government and her DUP allies who are vigorously pursuing higher and higher retirement ages for future generations of pensioners that are the MPs most at risk. The Conservatives got a high proportion of votes from the over 60s at the last general election so need these votes to win the next election.
The biggest voter power of this group is in the Isle of Wight – where there are over 10,000 people affected by the raising of the pension age.The Tory MP, Bob Seely appears to have an impregnable 20,998 majority – but that would be halved if this group of people voted didn’t vote for him.. The main challenger there is Labour who came second and if people switched their vote to Labour it would become a highly marginal seat.
Much more vulnerable is home secretary and ironically women and equalities minister Amber Rudd, whose Hastings and Rye seat, has 7400 people affected. She has a majority of 366 and Labour is the main challenger. There are 20 times more people hit by the change than her majority.
Another ultra marginal is Calder Valley where the Conservative MP Craig Whittaker,a Treasury whip, has a majority of 609 over Labour. There are 7000 people affected by the change in his constituency.
Similarly Corby where Tom Pursglove has a Conservative majority of 2,690 – it is more than outnumbered by 7,300 people affected. Both Milton Keynes seats (North and South) have small 2000+ Tory majorities but over 14,000 people affected between them. And Scarborough where Conservative MP Robert Goodwill has a 3435 majority is dwarfed by 7,100 people affected.
The entire London borough of Barnet is another hotspot. Chipping Barnet, where Theresa Villiers, Conservative MP and ex minister, has a 353 majority has 6,200 people affected. Labour is again the main challenger. Next door Hendon which also has 6.200 people affected. Tory MP Matthew Offord has a majority of 1072 over Labour .In Finchley and Golders Green Tory Mike Freer has a majority of 1657 over Labour and there are 6000 people affected.
There are also a string of safe Tory seats with between 7,000 and 7,800 pensioners who have lost out where the Tory majority can be severely dented or turned into marginals by switching to the highest challenger. Among these are Beverley and Holderness ( Graham Stuart majority 14,042); Bridgewater and West Somerset ( Ian Liddell-Grainger majority 15,448); Croydon South ( Chris Philp majority 11,406); South Dorset ( Richard Drax majority 11,695), Wells (James Heappey, majority 7585 over liberal democrat) and Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk ( John Lamont, majority 11,060).
Among Labour seats with over 7,000 pensioners affected include marginal Colne Valley (Thelma Walker majority 915) and safe seats Croydon North and Brent North. The most marginal with over 7000 affected people is Rutherglen and Hamilton West held by Gerrard Killen with a majority of 265 over SNP.
DUP seats with the largest numbers of people affected ( 6500 and 6400 respectively) are Upper Bann held by David Simpson with a 7,992 majority and Antrim North held by Ian Paisley Jnr with a 11,546 majority.
None of the Welsh Parliamentary seats had more than 7000 pensioners.
In addition there are those with lower numbers of people affected but who could influence the result. One is East Worthing and Shoreham which has 6,100 people affected. The MP is chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on State Pension Inequality for Women pensioners group, Tim Loughton. He has a 5106 majority over Labour.
These results suggest that Waspi and BackTo60 supporters supporters have more influence than they realise. It is a question of energising it.
Check your own constituency in the table here. It is an Excel document. Go the page and scroll until the bottom and click on constituency estimates.
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Time to get MPs to back the case of the 50s Women pensioners who have lost out
Today the One Voice BackTo60 group published a report by me that they commissioned on the case for lowering the pension age from 65, to going on 66, to 60.
The idea is regarded by all main parties as impossible and prohibitively expensive and all conventional thinkers believe cannot be achieved.
They base their claims on growing longevity, that the national insurance fund which pays out pensions is in the red, that all of the rest of Europe is raising pensions and that the new pension age is an equality measure.
All these facts are WRONG. For the first time in the UK , the projected age when we die is FALLING in poorer areas.
The National Insurance Fund is in the black. The hardship that 50’s pensioners are facing today are a calculation to save the government putting up national insurance rates until 2030. If the government did restore the money owed to the 50s pensioners, it would still be in the black until well beyond 2020.
The tide has begun to turn in Europe against raising the pension age. Poland, a country much poorer than the UK but starting to catch up with us fast, has LOWERED the pension age from 62 to 60. France under Macron is considering whether to implement a pledge by former president Mitterand to lower the pension age from 62 to 60.
And the idea of having of having an equal pension age for men and women is only superficially equal because of a host of unequal measures that the 1950s generation has had to put up with since they were born – from not being able to get mortgages, lower pay, lower occupational pensions, expected to quit work for long periods to bring up a family etc etc.
One Voice The group that is challenging the government over the shabby treatment of 50s women.
So how can the 3.3 million women affected get a result. For a start they are many and the Establishment are few. Their sheer voting power is enough to change any general election result.
Then you have two official reports – one by the totally respected House of Commons library and the other the current five year review of the state of the national insurance fund.
You need to weaponise the facts contained in both those reports to your advantage.
The House of Commons library report contains an accompanying document that gives a breakdown of where you all are – by Parliamentary constituency. Check the MPs majority and target him or her to change their mind. MPs are always worried about being re-elected, play on their fears.
The NI fund reveals the money is there – but also reveals that a future generation of pensioners will suffer if wages don’t go up ( that automatically increases NI contributions) and also if immigration stops – the flow of young, healthy people to the UK who automatically pay into the NI fund increases resources for pensioners ( elderly people don’t come to the UK because of its cold damp, drizzly winters – they prefer sunny Spain or Portugal).
Then there are the political parties. Not a single mainstream party has a decent policy for you.
The Tories only plan further rises in the pension age and have no interest in helping you out.
The Labour Party’s works and pensions spokesperson Debbie Abrahams has a cost neutral proposal which reduces the age to 64 but gives you a reduced pension for life. Totally unsatisfactory.
The Liberal Democrat spokesman, Stephen Lloyd, has an idea of giving everyone of you £15,000 tax free – a sticking plaster plan. How can you live on £15,000 for six years in some cases?
Put very simply you can explain to the Tories that they are in government because of older people’s votes. Tell them you won’t for them and very likely they won’t be in government.
You can influence Labour by targeting its huge membership of nearly 570,000. This means that even in constituencies where there is a big Tory majority – there is often now a big local Labour Party. For example my constituency Hertfordshire South West ( incidently the safe seat of David Gauke, the former works and pensions secretary) has 800-900 members. Lobby them, get them to put up a motion to the next party conference and get the Labour Party to change its policy.
You can also influence the Liberal Democrats – who now have more members than the Tories – and the Scottish and Welsh Nationalists to do the same thing.
Show them you are not going away and redress the shabby treatment you have received and win the argument.
Westminster Confidential 