Govt considering u-turn on WASPI compensation

[Ticklyoctopus]

https://news.sky.com/story/government-to-reconsider-whether-to-give-compensation-to-waspi-women-13468696

Oh God no 😖😖😖😖

This- me too!!! I was well aware even though I was born in the 80's.

And when the pension age is likely to go up again before I retire so , I do really begrudge giving massive payouts to people who needed to work until they were 65 (like the men already did!!) before they get a pension. Its those who are currently working who will be paying for this even though what we get in old age will be far worse that what we are currently funding for others.

I really begrudge the WASPI campaign and really hope the gov't doesnt pay out.

Plus the work shy, of course:

Must help them to keep having children they can’t afford. 🙄

https://www.itv.com/news/2025-11-11/starmer-hints-controversial-two-child-benefit-cap-will-be-axed-in-budget

Well if you would like to get your descriptor right, they are the baby boomer generation.

Stupid comment. The current generation get far more help thrown at them than in any previous decades. Food banks (just because they weren’t around a couple of decades ago, doesn’t mean they weren’t needed), benefits coming out of their ears - particularly those involving MH disability - people used to have to just get on with it. Subsidised child care. Hardly any childcare back in the day, let alone subsidised. Pay equality for women now which never existed. And I could go on. Oh…and the two child cap about to be removed, which means women can have as many kids as they wish courtesy of the British tax payer, whether they can afford them or not. I’m not a ‘boomer’ btw, but just get fed up with the current generation of workers and SAHMs whinging on here when they’ve got far more that anyone had 40/50 years ago. Check your privilege….

Wow the privilege on this thread is astounding. Bet those that are saying well my parents have a big house and an easy life have benefited from that lifestyle over the years and likely continue to do so

Not all boomers are well off, entitled or have had an easy life even though they have worked all their days. Many working age people now are supporting their parents as well as trying to support themselves

It is comments like well they should have planned better that show that privilege

And before anyone asks no I am not in that bracket but my mum is and if she gets something to make life easier for her then I’m all for it, better than some of the financial decisions being made

Its another look at a decision that said NO, its being done because of the judicial review.
The Govt hasn't got 10billion, so the original answer will still stand.

I’ve reported this thread. This thread is ageist, sexist and really mean spirited. Some of these affected women were left in very difficult situations with very little notice, not all, but some. This community should be supportive of these, not whipping up some of the vitriol I have read.

My husbands grandmother is the exact same. Literally have over a million jn the bank, a paid off house and her late husbands pension plus her own and she was so angry about the winter fuel allowance 😅
Her daughter (a waspi) thinks she, and this whole thing, is ridiculous and that they should take some personal responsibility in the same way as the rest of us need to.

I am a WASPI born 1957, i certainly knew about the changes years before they happened.
I wasn’t happy about it but I don’t understand how women in my age group were unaware of it.

I am amazed at the vitriol here towards baby boomers!
I am one. I don't think the waspis should get their compensation ( i was born in the late fifties), and I would happily give up my winter fuel payment to fund other areas of society. I have helped my kids no end financially and with child care. And im nowhere near as rich as some parents mentioned who have multiple properties etc.

Please don't tar us all with the same brush.

You’re making @CanaryChaffinch ’s point!

And the younger baby boomers (born 1964) are still working and it will be for another 6 years before they reach state pension age.

A cohort of 18 years have quite different experiences depending on when they were born. Some have the benefits or difficulty’s in line with the previous or the next generation and there are individual differences as well. There seems to be a massive assumption on here that baby boomers are dripping in multiple properties and have vast pensions when that is not the case. A few may do, but that is the exception out of any generation. Women in particular are worse off than men. Whilst younger women now have the benefit of access to equal pay (some still miss out), pensions etc it wasn’t always the case. The poorest pensioners are women. As long as women continue to have time away from the workplace for childbirth and child rearing, women as a group will continue to be worse off than men.

It’s about time we stopped pitting one generation or one person against another. Divide and conquer and the race to the bottom is not helpful for any of us.

I have two friends who fall into this category. They both readily admit that they new. I’m almost 60 and have always been aware of the changes.

Women in particular are worse off than men. Whilst younger women now have the benefit of access to equal pay (some still miss out), pensions etc it wasn’t always the case. The poorest pensioners are women.

But years ago marriage was routine, proposals happened and people very usually married before moving in together and women that financial stability even if they didn’t work. 1 wage could sustain a family, that just isn’t the norm now. And not working is in itself a benefit - slaving away full time for 45 years isn’t a great insurance for ‘just in case I get divorced’. Mil has had a lovely life, doing hobbies, meeting friends for lunch, gardening etc. I don’t really believe anyone would ‘wish they had worked full time’ instead

I'm obviously missing some part of this jigsaw.

I accept that maybe not everyone became aware of the change in state pension age from 60 to 65. But what I don't understand is what they would have done differently if they had known.

Saying "there wasn't enough notice to plan" - plan what?

Do people think that with notice they would have suddenly started saving loads of money? If they had money to save, why wouldn't they have been saving it anyway?

Surely the main difference (since we're constantly being told pensioners "worked hard all their lives" - my sister is in the age bracket and I can assure you she didn't) was that they had to work five extra years. Which I can understand is disappointing, but what are they suggesting would have happened if they'd known?

Or are they saying they retired at 60, not knowing there was no pension until they tried to claim it, and had to live for five years on nothing, unable to get another job?

We got more than one letter and it was all over the newspapers which most people had delivered pre social media. It was on the news. While this thread isn’t ageist in itself there are plenty of ageist posts on it. You can see several posts from women born in the 1950s saying that we were well aware, there shouldn’t be compensation etc. but then you have people generalising and talking about a whole generation being entitled because their MIL is grabby and moany and the man down the street says they’re wasting money on take away coffee. We have children and grandchildren, some of us are well aware of how hard it is to buy a home these days. We aren’t all rolling in it either, our houses are assets of course but we live in them. Some of us don’t have massive savings or incomes but still don’t agree with a payout for this. You see a certain vocal group on TV bleating about it , they don’t represent everyone.

@Ticklyoctopus but a lot of women were not financially independent from their husbands are were completely screwed if he died or left her and seldom had a pension in their own right. Hence women are the poorest of the current cohort of pensioners. Some of these women are the Waspi women who are being lambasted on here.

I personally have no beef either way, but I do think we are on a slippery slope when our government ignores the ruling of the ombudsman and it’s really saddening when younger women are saying what they are saying on here with such vitriol. Talk about the race to the bottom.

This thread is also rehashing the findings of the ombudsman. The findings are clear that there was maladministration regardless of what anyone says. As previous, the govt has to either review their stance or they will be back in court next month.

That’s all well and good if you had a happy stable marriage to someone with a good job. Just like today there are plenty who didn’t. I still don’t agree with compensation for this, it had to change and we were informed but don’t generalise from individual circumstances. For some women of that generation things were difficult and there was less help.

Have to disagree quite strongly. I think it would be absolutely wrong for an unelected and non judicial body to be able to impose a mandatory redress payment of £10 billion on a government.

The PHSO determined that some letters were sent a bit late. But it also concluded that the letters didn't make any difference and that most people were notified in good time. So its recommendation for a blanket payment was shaky at best and I am not surprised it was rejected.

The government also didn't "ignore" the recommendation - it sent a 60 odd page response setting out it's reasons for disagreeing with the recommendation and I struggle to find fault with them.

Ultimately it is for the courts to determine whether redress is required. The High Court already found in the government's favour in 2019. The WASPI movement is having another crack next month, as is their right, so we'll see what happens then.

It’s not “hate” or “ageism” to note that the boomer generation have ended up accruing not just a huge unearned wealth in housing but also have seen their incomes rise dramatically in real terms compared to those of younger working-age cohorts. They have had the triple whammy of benefiting disproportionately from housing, income consolidation and the triple lock. This means they are taking out much more in real terms then they ever contributed to the welfare state. There is no “savings fund” that they paid into: their pensions are being paid from taxation on current workers who not only will not see those pensions themselves, but are also struggling to afford housing.

There are simply tons of statistics on this available from the ONS and all sorts of reports going back decades. It’s not in doubt. When people talk about the boomer cohort they are referring to this. The fact that a (very few) of them didn’t benefit as much, doesn’t negate the fact that as a cohort they overwhelmingly did and still do - at the direct expense of younger taxpayers.

It’s not ageism to recognise this.

To start with, posters could read:

publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmworpen/59/5905.htm

You haven’t been here long,have you? It’s used as an insult all the time.

That was me.

And the ageist posts just keep on coming. It’s so depressing that women can’t stand shoulder to shoulder to fight injustice against our sex.

re: ‘left in very difficult situations’.

Do you realise people 30 years younger will need to work until their 70s for a state pension (if, quite frankly, they receive one at all).

Are you going to fight for women born after the 1950s to have their pension age moved back down to 60 then?