A HELENSBURGH campaigner protesting at the handling of changes to the state pension age for women has welcomed a watchdog's ruling on the issue.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman said this week that government officials at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had been too slow to tell many women born in the 1950s that they would be affected by the changes.

Members of the Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) group have been campaigning for years against the changes and the way they were communicated, saying they had no idea they would have to wait longer to receive their state pension.

Helensburgh resident Ann Greer, a member of the WASPI Argyll and the Isles group, has been a stalwart member of the campaign from its inception, protesting in Helensburgh, Glasgow, Oban, London and elsewhere to raise awareness of the issue and the situation she and many other women affected by the changes find themselves in.

READ MORE: Helensburgh pensions campaigner Ann is back on the march in bid to spread the WASPI word

Ann previously told the Advertiser the UK Government had made two changes to the age at which she will be entitled to draw her state pension without formally notifying her.

Following the publication of the PHSO's view, Ann said: “It’s time for the UK Government to fully compensate all women affected by the DWP’s state pension age maladministration.

“WASPI have been vindicated today by the PHSO’s report. We have waited long enough, and time is of the essence for women in our 60s.”

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 she had expected.

She, and hundreds of thousands of other women across the UK, have been left having to rely on savings which were supposed to supplement the state pension.

READ MORE: Councillors give their backing to Argyll and the Isles WASPI campaign

Amanda Amroliwala, chief executive of the PHSO, said: "We have found that DWP failed to act quickly enough once it knew a significant proportion of women were not aware of changes to their state pension age.

"It should have written to the women affected at least 28 months earlier than it did.

"We will now consider the impact of these failings, and what action should be taken to address them."

A DWP spokesman said: “Both the High Court and Court of Appeal have supported the actions of the DWP, under successive governments dating back to 1995, and the Supreme Court refused the claimants permission to appeal.

“In a move towards gender equality, it was decided more than 25 years ago to make the state pension age the same for men and women.”

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