Women affected by the state pension age increases have expressed disappointment after the High Court dismissed their claims that the changes were discriminatory.
Among them is 61-year-old Sandra Morris, who will not get her state pension until she is 66. Despite having chronic illnesses, she will continue to run her miniature artisan business until retirement age as, without her state pension, she cannot afford to take a step back.
Her partner, Pamela Shallcrass, 65, also has to wait another year for her pension.
61chrissterry 
While I feel sorry for these ladies the Government were acting in accordance with an EU Directive by ‘adoption of Council Directive 79/7/EEC, which addresses equal treatment in relation to statutory social security matters. The directive specifically required Member States to ensure that there was no direct or indirect discrimination whatsoever on grounds of sex by the end of 1984.’
‘From a technical perspective, while Article 4(1) of Directive 79/7 enshrines the principle of equal treatment, Article 7(1)(a) allows for exceptions to the overall principle when applied to setting pensionable age. It specifically acknowledged that changes in state pension need to be gradual and are the responsibility of Member States. In interpreting the scope of the exclusion, the Court of Justice of the EU held that such “discrimination” was necessary in order to achieve the overarching objectives of the directive.’
The above in ‘ ‘ are extracts from a LSE article ‘What part did the EU play in raising women’s pensionable age?’ https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/brexit/2016/06/16/what-part-did-the-eu-play-in-raising-womens-pensionable-age/
The Directive originated in 1978 being *’council directive 79/7/eec of 19 december 1978 being Council Directive of 19 December 1978 on the progressive implementation of the principle of equal treatment for men and women in matters of social security (79/7/EEC) http://www.legislation.gov.uk/eudr/1979/7/contents‘
*Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
Granted the Government did not write to every person affected, but were they in a position to do so. Did they, in fact, know of everyone affected, perhaps they did through some system. At the time there was much publicity, but who reads information relating to pensions and if they do, would they understand it.
Is the problem that the pension ages were going to increase or was it that the ladies affected were not informed directly, or is it both.
Would this have occured if we were not in the EU?
Are these ladies remain or leave?
How many more EU rulings are there that have affected peoples lives within the UK and if we stay how many more to come, are remainers advising people on these points?
But with austerity would pension age equalisation have accured any way?
Many questions, but how many answers?
This just shows nothing is clear and many situations may not be as they seem.
Unfortunately this is not helping the ‘Waspi Women’ and their lack of pension. The Prime Minister has said he will look with “fresh vigour”, well lets hope so for the Waspi Women.
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