WASPI compensation: John Milne MP praises WASPI campaigners in Parliament after almost 6,000 women in Horsham “betrayed” by Labour.

The Government has announced that it will not compensate women hit by changes to the state pension age, despite backing campaigners in opposition, with John Milne MP saying that they have been “betrayed” and calling the decision by Labour “inconsistent” and “disappointing”.

Liz Kendall, Secretary of State for the Department of Work and Pensions, had to defend the government’s decision in Parliament earlier this week whilst John Milne MP accused her department of getting “the answer [they] always wanted to find” by betraying the WASPI campaign. He congratulated the hard work of the campaigners, noting that the word ‘WASPI’ had entered the Oxford English Dictionary last month - demonstrating the credit due to the women behind the hard-fought struggle for compensation.

Data from the House of Commons Library, using population estimates, indicates that 5,780 women in the Horsham constituency could be impacted by the decision.

John Milne has called on the Government to “urgently change course and rethink this decision.”

Commenting on the data, John Milne MP said: “These figures show that thousands of people in Horsham have been betrayed by the Government’s decision to not compensate WASPI women. This is wrong as promises were made and not kept. The Ombudsman were clear in their findings and a government simply bulldozing those findings is unprecedented.”

“Millions of women across this country trusted this government to do the right thing. In opposition, Labour promised to right the wrongs but now they’re rowing back on this. To go through the Ombudsman’s report with “a fine-tooth comb” and then utterly dismiss the findings is deeply confusing.

“The Conservatives left our economy in a shambles, but pensioners shouldn’t be asked to pay the price. The Liberal Democrats will fight for WASPI women and the Government must urgently change course and rethink this shameful decision.”