'Devastating' WASPI update over £2,950 DWP compensation is 'not surprising'

A WASPI warning has been issued in the wake of the Labour Party Budget last week, which saw pensioners descend on Whitehall demanding £2,950 payouts from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). WASPI campaigners have renewed their calls for payments in the wake of the Ombudsman report.

Angela Madden, campaign chair of the group fighting for justice for women pensioners, said: "Things are more expensive now because they went up all year, not just one or two months at the end. So with the Winter Fuel Payment gone and the not very good increase to our state pensions, we will just about stand still."

Ms Madden said it "wasn't a very good Budget" for old people. She said: "They use the excuse of rich pensioners. I actually don't know any rich pensioners, I'm sure there are some. There certainly are some in Parliament. Their judgment is perhaps coloured by their work colleagues being rich pensioners, but in society there are so many struggling to get by."

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She warned: "Many women operate just above the level for Pension Credit. Women who are single and living in their own or rented accommodation, they've only got one small pension income coming into the house. The state pension even at £220 a week is half the minimum wage. If that's all people have got, then they're in trouble. Even people on minimum wage struggle to pay all their bills."

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman published a report in March that stated the Department for Work and Pensions had failed to adequately communicate changes about the women's state pension age.

One protester told the BBC that she was not "devastated" by the Budget snub "because it's not surprising." They said: "They missed us off once again, and they've been doing that certainly for the last three years."

Mary Jones, who is also a member of the Northamptonshire group, said it was "absolutely amazing" to be at Westminster on Wednesday. "We were doing our best to make them aware that we were there," she said.

"We were bitterly disappointed, but thankfully quite a few of the MPs came out afterwards and spoke to us and gave us so much hope. They told us to keep going, and that is exactly what we are going to do. We are never going away."