Christmas may be just around the corner, but not everyone is in festive spirits quite yet. The mood has certainly soured among the WASPI women campaigning for government compensation over changes to the state pension age. On Tuesday, Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall announced that no payouts would be forthcoming, with costs of up to £10.5 billion not deemed ‘fair or appropriate’ by the Labour lot. Now, Kendall is not only facing backlash from pension activists but from within her own party too.
The now-Secretary of State has been on quite the journey over the issue, as Mr S revealed yesterday, blogging on her own website as recently as 2019 that she was a ‘longstanding supporter of the WASPI campaign’ and that ‘this injustice can’t go on’. Even Sir Keir Starmer himself used the same term to describe the plight of the WASPI women before he secured the top job. How times change, eh?
Not that Labour’s top team is being allowed to forget their U-turn. Veteran politician and vocal backbench critic Diane Abbott took to Twitter to slam the about turn, fuming:
Promising one thing in Opposition and doing the opposite in government is a betrayal.
The Hackney North MP was not holding back at PMQs today either, raging at Starmer:
We promised [the WASPI women] we would give them justice… Does the PM really understand how let down they feel today?
Abbott isn’t the only one taking a pop at the PM. Alloa and Grangemouth MP Brian Leishman told LBC’s Andrew Marr he was ‘raging’ at the move, going on:
I think raging is an absolutely apt and accurate assessment. This is a matter of fairness, I think, plain and simple and the Waspi women have been historically let down, and not just let down, but they have been betrayed.
Oo er. Talk about a lack of festive cheer, eh?
Do the WASPI women deserve compensation? Katy Balls discusses with Isabel Hardman and Kate Andrews on the most recent Coffee House Shots podcast:
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