1950s women "Fight Back Rally"

I was aware of the change to SRP age, but do think it could have been done a but more gradually, many, myself included, had 6 more years. I still stopped working at 60, but I am aware that a 60 year old cleaner or carer, for example, would find the additional 6 years physically difficult.

We’re comparing apples and oranges Doodledog. My situation was very different to yours. I worked full time for the whole of my career. From 1970 until the mid 80s I worked in public sector legal departments then moved into private practice where again I had parity of pay and pension scheme participation. When I became a partner I was self employed so had to take out a private pension. I too was contracted out for some years. Whilst that reduces your state pension, it swells your occupational or private pension pot. Unfortunately my pot was not swelled because I was with Equitable Life.
There really is no excuse for women saying they didn’t know about the intended increases in pension age. I knew, though my age is such that I’m not affected.

I read newspapers and I listened to the news every day. There is no excuse for being uninformed about what is going on in the world.

How’s about poor reading skills, a low level of education, a lifestyle that doesn’t allow for reading newspapers every day while struggling to keep your family afloat, even, dare I say it, a low IQ? Have you just never met anyone in any of these categories?

I get a letter from my credit card supplier every time there’s a minor change to its terms and conditions. Would it have been too much to ask for every woman to have been sent a letter to inform them of this massive change to their future finances?

Doodledog The reduction from opting out didn't start until the 2011 changes and it was included in the details which were made public. I well remember working it all out and pointing it out in a group I belonged to at the time. However, nobody took any notice. They were more interested in more interesting topics - such as the state of the Royal Family, transgender issues or whatever the latest dead cat at the time was.

Glorianny

Can you explain then if you are interested in equality Gsm and notgran why all men were personally informed of a one year increase in their pension age but all women were not personally informed of a 6 year increase in theirs. How is that equality?
And why company pension schemes were not equal for women until 1990?
What's equal about any of this?

You'd have to go back to the mid 90s for the answer to that one.

Presumably everybody was informed of the 2011 changes. Or are you saying that only men were informed?

If WASPI had ever bothered with all the other changes, I'd support them. Why wouldn't I? My birthday means I was one one of the first women to be affected by the changes.

Most people aren't aware there were also changes to entitlement for over 60s (men and women) to Universal Credit and Housing Benefit. WASPI doesn't care about the men who were also affected. WASPI doesn't care about the women who were born on or after 1st January 1960 either. Most of them will be even more badly affected.

I too was contracted out for some years. Whilst that reduces your state pension, it swells your occupational or private pension pot.
Yes, I know. My point though, is that none of us can say what others should have been aware of, any more than we can say what others can and can't afford. The implications of contracting out were not made clear, and many women (wrongly) believed that they would get a full state pension because they had paid in when others hadn't, only to find that they would get less than someone who had had their 'stamp' paid for them when it was too late to fund the difference. Whether they 'should have known' this or not is not the point, IMO.

I also worked full time, but on renewable contracts before my F/T post, just with unpaid holiday periods. I have over 40 full years, as it was the occupational pension I was barred from, not NI contributions.

I shall ignore the dig about transgender issues, growstuff. Apart from being entirely unnecessary, it is irrelevant to this discussion, and dragging things from one thread to another is against the spirit of Gransnet. Please don't bother addressing me in future, as this is at least the third time in the past week that you have been needlessly personal and I really can't be bothered.

I really don’t understand the point you are making about being contracted out Doodledog. Unless people were in a private pension which went bust, as mine (Equitable Life, which largely dealt with professionals) did, their pension pots were considerably enhanced by government contributions and usually private pensions can be drawn upon earlier than the state pension nowadays. So not a bad result and unless their pension fund went up in smoke they are better off. They surely couldn’t expect government contributions to their private pensions AND a full state pension!

Doodledog and again being contracted out wasn't exclusively for 1950's women. All people in an occupational/private pension scheme were/are contracted out. If you have been contracted out it means you are receiving at least 2 pensions and you will be better off. Furthermore during your working life while a member of the pension scheme, you were paying less National Insurance.

Absolutely, you can’t have it all ways.

I’m nearly 65 and presently, could not imagine a life where I didn’t work, as meaningful work validates ME and I’m sure could do the same for many others.
My mother worked part time until she was 83 and her mother until she was 80. Both lived full and active lives, my gran until 94 - ma still lives a very active independent life at 87.
Contrast this with others in my experience that recently retired at state pension age. Or even earlier, as a friend at the 42 year point (aged 60)where his pension would have accrued no further value. All quickly became health obsessed, with little conversation and a poor outlook.
I know in which group I’d rather be.

I was born in 1953 so was I think in the first batch of women affected. I retired at 60, got a work pension straight away and State Pension at 63. I knew this would happen, and so did my friends of the same age. Don’t you think we should be aware of what’s going on in our lives? Watch the news, read the papers, ask HR at work.

Yes, I'd have been content to get my pension at 63 as well - the first hike to the SPA seemed a big one, but I was resigned to it. But having been born one year after you, I had to wait till I was 66. Can't you see why some people feel that this is unfair?

Take a class of girls in one school year. The oldest born on 1 September 1952, the youngest, sitting next to her, on 31 August 1953.

The first girl reached state retirement age on 6 January 2015, the second on 6 November 2017. A difference of 2 years and 10 months. That's an awful lot of pension income for one classmate to lose.

silverlining48 that pension difference is much more unfair than any age related difference.

My daughter is in her 40s and she knew that women's pension are was going up by one year a year from 1950 to 1955 its the women born between 1953 and 1955 that were really shafted and no one else.

That difference in pension is far far more unjust. A pension should be a pension and everyone should get the same.

Germanshepherdsmum

I really don’t understand the point you are making about being contracted out Doodledog. Unless people were in a private pension which went bust, as mine (Equitable Life, which largely dealt with professionals) did, their pension pots were considerably enhanced by government contributions and usually private pensions can be drawn upon earlier than the state pension nowadays. So not a bad result and unless their pension fund went up in smoke they are better off. They surely couldn’t expect government contributions to their private pensions AND a full state pension!

Sorry, it's not very clear from my post, and isn't particularly important to my post, really - I was responding to your response to a throwaway comment in my first post, if that makes sense?

What I was saying, admittedly not very clearly, was that whatever people on this thread (including me) may have known or not known, there are women who expected to retire at 60 on a full state pension, plus whatever they had accrued in their occupational one, and they made plans accordingly.

To then find out that no, they had to wait for years to return, and then that they are not entitled to a full state pension either was extremely difficult. Not everyone can afford to pay £800 for each year they were contracted out in order to get the full state pension (if you can afford it, then you can have it both ways), and not everyone can afford to hire an IFA or has the knowledge or confidence to seek out professional advice.

To deny that there are women who were not aware that the changes were going to affect them is not only to call those women liars, but is also to fly in the face of the findings of the Ombudsman, who, although finding against the affected women did find that the changes in 2005 were not effectively communicated and that the decision to write to all affected women was not followed up. Where you (generic), I or anyone else was aware of the changes is neither here nor there. None of us should hold up ourselves as touchstones for what others should know, do or feel. IMO it is offensive to do so.

Thankyou, Doodledog.

I genuinely didn't know about the pension age change beyond a vague awareness that something was going to happen. I didn't know it would go from 60-65 virtually overnight, and I remember my despair when I saw it has sneaked farther to 66.

And I had never, ever heard of contracting out until I finally made it to 66, roughly two years ago, and I posted on GN about not receiving the full pension, and people told me about it.

Still don't understand it; was not told about it at the time; had no explanation from DWP, even when I wrote and asked them; my letter inviting me to apply for my pension made no mention of it, simply gave me the full amount that they said I would get.

Since I did retire, almost nine years ago, on health grounds, I feel to have been chasing the financial stability of the state pension with a butterfly net: I nearly get it, then it flies just out of reach again.

The point I was trying to make about being contracted out, Doodledog, is that government contributions to your private pension should more than compensate for a lower state pension so one would, in the absence of one’s private pension provider going bust, actually be better off overall.

As for women being unaware, that can only be so if they don’t read newspapers or listen to the news. I have no sympathy for the ‘I didn’t have time for that’ attitude. One can listen to the news whilst doing all manner of household tasks if need be. I’m sure you did it, just as I did.

You were far from the only one who didn’t know the details of the rise in state pension age, Ailidh. The Parliamentary Ombudsman has conducted an investigation into how women were informed and this is from their report:

Unpublished DWP research from 2007 found 85% of women aged 48 to 59 knew State Pension age was going to be equalised, but many women did not know when it would happen. The research also found that 50% of women whose State Pension age had risen to between 60 and 65, and 36% of women whose State Pension age had risen to 65, still thought that it was 60.

I heard about the changes through my job, and passed the information on to friends and colleagues, many of whom hadn’t realised the implications for themselves.

Germanshepherdsmum

The point I was trying to make about being contracted out, Doodledog, is that government contributions to your private pension should more than compensate for a lower state pension so one would, in the absence of one’s private pension provider going bust, actually be better off overall.

As for women being unaware, that can only be so if they don’t read newspapers or listen to the news. I have no sympathy for the ‘I didn’t have time for that’ attitude. One can listen to the news whilst doing all manner of household tasks if need be. I’m sure you did it, just as I did.

Potentially so, GSM, but that doesn't alter the fact that whether you sympathise with them or not, there are women who did not know, or fully understand about opting out, including some on this thread.

I do understand that opting out has shifted some of my contributions from State to Occupational pension (I'm not sure at what point I realised the implications, to be honest, but it was before I stopped working), and I am able to pay for the missing years, but as I keep saying, that is not the point. The information that people can easily access, or more accurately the information which is freely given, is the headline rate of the State Pension, and people can be forgiven for assuming that that is what they will get if they have worked and paid in for decades, and that it will be paid in full on top of their occupational pensions.

We keep hearing about civil servants getting 'gold plated' pensions, but according to The Institute For Government Nearly half (49.7%) of civil servants are paid below £30,000. Higher salaries are less common: just under a quarter (24.2%) of civil servants earn more than £40,000 and less than 3% earn over £70,000., so for most civil servants even full pensions are not going to be high, and when you bear in mind that many people will have been contracted out too, and their State Pensions will be reduced accordingly, these 'gold plated' sums don't seem so attractive. Of course, most people will not even get the apparently 'good' pensions of civil servants, so the impact will be even greater on smaller amounts.

It is relatively recently that most homes have had access to the Internet, and without it, getting hold of forecasts and so on was something that people with no computer expertise (which was fairly common until recently) would struggle to do. I don't suppose that YouGov and the like would even have had personalised information online in the 90s and early 2000s, as far fewer people would be able to access it than can do so nowadays.

Yes, there are those who have their finger on the pulse of finance and government announcements, and those who follow the news more than others, but someone working long hours with small children and all sorts of other things going on in her life can, IMO, be forgiven for skimming the financial pages and glancing at the take-home bit of her payslip.

I do think that it was the responsibility of the government to actively inform people (not leave it for them to find out) of the additional years that were added to the working lives of women, and that they did not do so at least in part because it was women who were affected by the changes.

Well said Doodledog.

Doodledog: Is your occupational/private pension not greater than it would been if you were not contracted out? It certainly should be. And it is normally the case that you can access it earlier than you can now receive the state pension and take a lump sum from it. In which case why the need to buy extra years of NICs, as opposed to the opportunity to even further improve your position than contracting out has done?

Tbh, GSM I don't know what it would have been if I hadn't been opted out.

I don't really understand the last bit of your post, sorry. I have three years to go to get my pension, and three more years to buy back. I retired at the age of 57, and drew my occupational pension at 60, living on savings before then. What could I do to improve my position, given that I could, if necessary buy all the years now? I have been buying them a year at a time, so that in the event of an early death there would be more to leave behind. At this stage, I am only a few pounds short of a full State Pension, but it was quite a lot when I started paying.

Your occupational pension should be considerably higher than it would have been because each year you were contracted out not only you and your employer but the government were paying into it. I’m considerably worse off because my pension provider went bust. I don’t get a full state pension but haven’t bought any years of NICs to cover the contracted out period. It galls me to see my husband receiving a higher state pension but what happened to me with Equitable Life happened to so many others too. I’m fortunate not to be wholly dependent on my pension income, but if I were dependent on it I would weigh the cost of buying extra years against the risk that I may not live long enough to enjoy much benefit. I would rather keep the money and spend it as I wish than risk the Treasury ending up with the benefit of it.

Thanks. Yes, my occupational pension will be higher than if I hadn't contracted out - I understand that, even though I don't know by how much exactly. My point though, as I keep saying, is not about me, but about how a lot of people don't accept that not everyone was aware of either the fact that they had been contracted out, or the impact of doing so, and on top of that did not realise that the SPA had risen for women.

I was union rep in my last job, and I dealt with a good few cases where people were astonished that they wouldn't get their full pension, and I am very well aware that those cases are very common amongst people in lower paid occupations. Similarly, knowing about the raised SPA might have been expected if you have been able to access the Internet since it happened, and if you could afford a daily newspaper, and had time to read the financial pages, but not everyone is in that position, and as a feminist it saddens me when other women deny that those who say so are telling the truth.

I’m sure you’re very savvy, Doodledog, certainly more than I was, but can I mention for the benefit of anyone who isn’t that I was strongly advised to check with the Future Pensions service before I bought up any missing years. It’s a good job I did, as I found that two of the years I was hoping to pay for wouldn’t have made any difference to my pension, and I was told that HMRC wouldn’t have warned me of that, they’d just have accepted the voluntary payments.

Also, for anyone who does any childcare at all for grandchildren and hasn’t heard of Specified Adult Childcare Credits, they are a simple and free way of adding to your state pension.