WASPI Campaign .... State Pensions

jamesd

uk1 wrote: »

"http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN02234/SN02234.pdf"]

Thanks, that's interesting. The source I used gave the unable reasoning but it seems that that didn't come up in the debates about it, maybe it was too obvious or universally accepted. I'll see if I can find that original source for my post again.

I suppose it's easy enough to agree that the three reasons given in the research briefing no longer make sense today, even if only because people are expected to plan for retirement in the age difference case.

Pennylane

Here's Jo Cox on women's pensions.

http://www.jocox.org.uk/tag/womens-pensions/

There's plenty more out there. She wasn't a stupid woman and I'm sure she wouldn't have involved herself if she thought that what women are complaining about was not worthy of her time and effort.

Daniel54

Pennylane wrote: »

There's plenty more out there. She wasn't a stupid woman and I'm sure she wouldn't have involved herself if she thought that what women are complaining about was not worthy of her time and effort.

The Labour party front and back benches have been consistent in their objections to some of the provisions of the 2011 Act

They have provided no support for Waspi's objections to the 1995 Act.Look at Owen Smith's proposals in the debate or Barbara Keeley's references to a £30 bn Osborne pension grab

However you are conflating the two Acts and asking for compensation for both ( 6 years extension,thousands lost)

By all means support the Labour view ( rejected by Waspi) but don't pretend or claim Labour supports the Waspi view on 1995

As the campaign itself is unable to articulate what they mean by a " fair transitional arrangement" then Mrs Cox would have been equally in the dark

I can easily see that she would have wished to support disadvantaged women in poor financial circumstances.But that is not Waspi's aim, is it?

jamesd

Pennylane wrote: »

Here's Jo Cox on women's pensions.

http://www.jocox.org.uk/tag/womens-pensions/

There's plenty more out there. She wasn't a stupid woman and I'm sure she wouldn't have involved herself if she thought that what women are complaining about was not worthy of her time and effort.

Maybe she thought it was worth her time but it's just repeating the same poor arguments that others have given. On the specific points she mentioned:

1. "the way the Government has hastened this process without any hint of concern for the impact it will have on half a million women". Is it really half a million women harmed (not just affected) by the most recent change? And what about the added time under the old arrangements that was done to reduce the impact? That doesn't seem like nothing to me.

2. A constituent: "My job is physically demanding and while I am perfectly able to do this now and I hope for a few more years, I cannot imagine being able to do it for another 10 years." I wonder what that job is and what happens to men who do the same job but who will reach state pension age six years later. Is it physically demanding only for women? What plans has this woman made to allow her to retire before state pension age? The argument seems to be that it's hard for me and since I'm a woman I should get the state pension sooner than a man doing the same job.

3. A constituent: "During my working life, I had planned carefully for my financial future which included my state pension at 60. It doesn’t seem fair to me that the goalposts were moved when I had made all my contributions on that premise." Why was she planning for something that ended decades ago? That's not very responsible planning for retirement and it's not exactly hard to check. Since the change to start to equalise ages was introduced the goalposts have also changed to do things like:

a. cut the number of years to get a full basic state pension to 30, greatly helping women who typically have fewer working years than men
b. introduce the flat rate state pension with a full payment rate at 35 years that is expected to benefit women much more than men
c. introduce the minimum income guarantee in 1999 to help the poorest state pensioners, many of those women after a spouse has died.
d. introduce S2P to replace SERPS in 2002, with a higher accrual rate for the first part of income to help lower earners, including the many women who work part time

So does this woman really want to go back to her entitlements prior to the Act that introduced the equalisation? Even though it would probably result in a substantially lower state pension for her and many other women? I suppose that after properly costing it I might support that because I think that it would probably save money, at the expense of this group of women. And how could she object on her always expected argument since she can never at the time of the equalisation act have had any entitlement to these things that were introduced later?

This one is particularly foolish when some women use their state pension age before the equalisation act but calculate their "loss" using all of the increases since then, claiming they were always entitled to them.

4. "It’s ironic that women who lived and worked through an era where it was harder to make a living, secure employment and maintain that employment will now be penalised by steps to end gender inequality. Society for most of their working life accepted that they couldn’t earn the same as men, or make the same provisions for their later years in the way men could and yet now they are told to work beyond what they planned and expected." I don't agree that discriminating against one group is best addressed by discriminating against another group. It's best addressed by ending the discrimination against both. Earnings are of course largely irrelevant for the flat rate state pension which values years exactly the same whatever the earnings were, provided they were over the minimum threshold, a measure that particularly helps low earners, like part-timers, particularly benefiting the many women who work that way.

5. "It is within the gift of this government". It's within the spending (but not gift) possibility of a government to take money from other people to pay for something for this group of women, but what about the harm done to those other people by it? Money doesn't appear by magic, tax payers pay for it, or it's cut from somewhere else.

Sadly those arguments have reduced my respect for her, particularly the aspect of championing increased gender discrimination against one group to favour another group because of past gender discrimination.

jem16

Goldiegirl wrote: »

I can't recall having heard Jo Cox's name in connection with WASPI in the same way that, say, Mhari Black's name has been.

No, neither can I.

She may have been supportive to her WASPI constituents, but I don't think it's right to claim she was some sort of passionate WASPI campaigner, and I think it's wrong for WASPI supporters to 'annex' her memory in an attempt to gain sympathy for their cause.

As a Labour MP, it doesn't surprise me at all that Jo Cox was supportive of her WASPI constituents as I think you'd be very hard pushed to find one who is not. For most it's good publicity to stand against the government. As said already, there is not one Labour MP who supports looking at the 1995 Act again.

However not all of them are passionate about their support. Those that are have joined the WASPI APPG which I don't believe Jo Cox had done. These are the areas that it appears she cared about.

Among Jo’s parliamentary interests are foreign policy, international development, early years education and social isolation. She is also taking a keen interest in the northern economy and regional devolution and is a member of the Communities and Local Government select committee.

Jo is co-chair of the Friends of Syria All Party Parliamentary Group and is an active member of parliamentary groups working on Palestine, devolution, Pakistan, Kashmir and Yorkshire’s regional economy.

Seabee42

It is very easy to support something without finding the money to pay for it.

Pennylane

Daniel54 wrote: »

The Labour party front and back benches have been consistent in their objections to some of the provisions of the 2011 Act

They have provided no support for Waspi's objections to the 1995 Act.Look at Owen Smith's proposals in the debate or Barbara Keeley's references to a £30 bn Osborne pension grab

However you are conflating the two Acts and asking for compensation for both ( 6 years extension,thousands lost)

By all means support the Labour view ( rejected by Waspi) but don't pretend or claim Labour supports the Waspi view on 1995

As the campaign itself is unable to articulate what they mean by a " fair transitional arrangement" then Mrs Cox would have been equally in the dark

I can easily see that she would have wished to support disadvantaged women in poor financial circumstances.But that is not Waspi's aim, is it?

Says here she was a supporter of the WASPI campaign

http://citywire.co.uk/money/murdered-mp-jo-cox-fought-for-women-s-state-pension/a922444

dunstonh

Pennylane wrote: »

Says here she was a supporter of the WASPI campaign

http://citywire.co.uk/money/murdered-mp-jo-cox-fought-for-women-s-state-pension/a922444

If you read the article, you will notice that Jo Cox was focusing on the 2011 changes and not the 1995 changes.

Some of the MPs were clearly indicating low knowledge and understanding of the pension changes in 1995 and 2011. Some were just doing it for political reasons as it was an easy win for them to go against the Government even if the case had no merit. However, at least Jo Cox was focusing on the key area where there were issues. It is a shame WASPI does not do the same as the those women badly affected by the 2011 changes would stand more chance of a compromised solution.

atush

So in fact, that does not mean she was a supporter of Waspi then.

Goldiegirl

Pennylane wrote: »

Says here she was a supporter of the WASPI campaign

http://citywire.co.uk/money/murdered-mp-jo-cox-fought-for-women-s-state-pension/a922444

Why does it matter to you so much.


She's dead now, and it's a crying shame that a promising MP and family person has been murdered.


It's just seems so distasteful to keep on trying to couple her and WASPI in the same sentence


Isn't it more respectful to let it rest now?