PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
State Retirement Pensions: Females (13 September 2016)

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimates his Department has made of potential cost of proposed transitional measures to address the effects on women born in the 1950s following state pension equalisation.

Asked by:
Debbie Abrahams (Labour)

Transitional arrangements are already in place. At the time of the Pensions Act 2011 the Government introduced a concession worth £1.1 billion to limit the impact of the rising State Pension age on those most affected. The concession capped the maximum delay that anyone would face in claiming their State Pension to 18 months rather than two years, relative to the previous timetable. The Government has no plans to introduce further transitional arrangements.

The following link https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dwp-foi-releases-for-march-2016 provides:

• information on the transitional arrangements considered during the passage of the Pensions Act 2011 (see table A); and
• illustrative costings for hypothetical policies including the three requested by the previous Minister for Pensions (see tables B to D).

These options are not under policy consideration.

Answered by:
Caroline Nokes (Conservative)
10 October 2016