A HELENSBURGH pensions campaigner joined demonstrators from across Argyll and Bute at one of the area’s best-known monuments to highlight efforts to persuade the UK government to introduce fair transitional arrangements for women born in the 1950s.

Ann Greer travelled to McCaig’s Tower in Oban for the latest phase of the WASPI (Women Against State Pension Inequality) campaign.

With the agreement of local Argyll and Bute councillor Roddy MacCuish, the famous building was lit up in purple in support of the group’s government lobbying.

WASPI campaigners from all over the UK want the Westminster government to introduce transitional arrangements for women affected by changes to the state pension age, which was raised from 60 to 65 in 1995 and by a further year in 2011.

Many of the women affected were not notified about the changes and took early retirement, leaving them without any income.

Ann took voluntary redundancy from her work as a counsellor in 2014, without being officially told she would not receive her state pension until 2024 – six years later than expected.

At the rain-soaked photocall at McCaig’s Tower, Ann said: “ I have lost around £50,000 due to six years being added on to the state pension age for women – not including national insurance contributions.

“Apart from the devastating personal consequences for many of Scotland’s women – and there are almost a quarter of a million of us – that money, paid to Westminster throughout all our working lives, has been lost from local economies.”