Greg Wright: Millions should not have to face pension inequality

So, despite our apparently straitened circumstances, Mrs May still managed to pull off the stunning feat of finding an extra £1bn in funding for Northern Ireland over the next two years, to help her stay in power by cementing her deal with the Democratic Unionist Party,

This development has been viewed with consternation – and bitterness – by a campaigning group which claims that millions of women are facing hardship because of the botched manner in which the Government has handled measures to equalise the state pension age.

They would love to receive a transitional payment from the magic money tree, but the Government shows no signs of budging.

When it comes to planning for changes to your retirement date, there is nothing like being given notice. Members of Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) claim the Government has given them nothing like sufficient notice to plan for state-enforced changes to their own retirement planning.

The group argues that around 3.5 million women who were born in the 1950s were not given enough time by the Government to react to plans to ensure men and women retired at the same age.

Angela Madden, a director of the WASPI campaign, said: “Many women born in the 1950s started work at 15 years old, and have worked for more than 40 years paying into the National Insurance fund expecting to retire at 60.”

Ms Madden said that the 1995 Act set out to equalise the state pension age for women and men, so women’s pension age was set to rise to 65 by 2020.

She added: “The 2011 Act brought this rise forward to 2018, and raised both men and women’s pension age to 66. Unfortunately, no one thought to tell us,’’ she added. “Some women received letters only two years before their expected retirement date informing them that their state pension age was up to six years later. Some women still haven’t been informed.”

According to Ms Madden, six years of “lost” pension adds up to a whopping £36,000. WASPI doesn’t want the Government to reverse the changes to the state pension age, but it is seeking fair transitional arrangements for all the women affected.

Thousands of WASPI campaigners are facing years of anguish. The case of Sheila Clark, a member of the WASPI group in Castleford, is typical. She has worked and paid taxes for most of her adult life and believed the Government would treat her fairly in return.

She said: “I took redundancy 10 years ago to look after my ageing father, who’s still going strong at the age of 92, my plan being that the redundancy payment, the pittance which is carers’ allowance and financial support from my husband, would see me through to 60 and then I would receive my state pension.

“Well, how wrong can you be? Twenty-three months before my 60th birthday, I received a letter from the Department of Work and Pensions informing me I would not be receiving my state pension until July 2019, five years and five months after I had been expecting to receive it .

“How do you start to plan for this? How do you make up that shortfall? It’s impossible. Three months after my 60th birthday my husband suddenly took ill and passed away nine weeks later, so now I have to face it all alone. The financial worry, hardship and stress is overwhelming.

“I’m not alone. There are thousands of other 1950s women coping alone. Trying to get through. Trying to survive to state pension age.”

There is no sign of a Government U-turn. A spokesman told me that the decision to equalise the state pension age between men and women was made over 20 years ago and achieves a “long-overdue” move towards gender equality.

He added: “There are no plans to change the transitional arrangements already in place. Women retiring today can still expect to receive the state pension for 26 years on average – several years longer than men.”

The state was happy to tax these women for decades. The failure to provide them with anything approaching a reasonable period of notice about delays to their retirement date smacks of an administrative howler; an error which is making life hell for people like Sheila Clark.

In the end it’s all about priorities. The Government is so feeble that it had to use the “magic money tree” to cling on to power.

If it shakes the tree again, it might just find enough cash to make life bearable for millions of women who have been betrayed by a state they supported for so long.

Greg Wright is the deputy business editor of The Yorkshire Post