GOVERNMENT plans to accelerate the increases in state pension age will result in approximately 2,600 Brighton and Hove women having to wait over a year longer before receiving their state pension.

The plans have left leaving women nationwide aged 56 and 57 feeling robbed. 300,000 women nationwide born between 6 December 1953 and 5 October 1954, will have to wait an extra 18 months, and an unlucky 33,000 will have to wait an extra 2 years, before being entitled to their state pension. About 2,600 of these are in Brighton and Hove.

The majority of these women will already be well underway in their plans for retirement, with many already working reduced hours in order to care for grandchildren or elderly parents.  Yet they are now being forced to make significant changes to their financial plans, with just 5 years notice before the changes kick in.  

Those unlucky enough to have been born between 6 March 1954 and 5 April 1954 are set to lose around £10,000 in lost state pension, with less than 7 years to attempt to accommodate the change.

Brighton & Hove Labour & Co-operative Leader, Councillor Gill Mitchell, said:

“The Government’s plans to increase the state pension age disproportionately affects women, and 2,600 such women in Brighton and Hove are being made to wait up to two years longer for their state pension.  Many of these women have juggled working lives with raising a family, and have very little retirement saving to fall back on.  The lack of warning about these changes means they do not have enough time to adjust to their carefully thought-out retirement plans.”

Labour Shadow Pensions Minister, Rachel Reeves MP said:

“Despite the Coalition Agreement stating that they would not raise the state pension age for women before 2020, the government have taken another ‘u-turn’ on their policy and we will be fighting these changes every step of the way.”