40,000 women worse off with new pension
A radical shake-up of state pensions unveiled by the Government today will leave 40,000 Scottish women born in the 1950s worse off by £1900 a year, it was revealed today.
Ministers said their proposals would simplify the current complicated system and particularly benefit women, low earners and the self-employed, with a single flat rate state pension, equivalent to around £144 a week in today’s money, introduced for new pensioners from 2017.
But the Government’s White Paper admitted a number of people will lose out, with Labour claiming that more than 400,000 women on the verge of retirement will miss out while men in the same position will still benefit. Under the new system, around one in five people reaching state pension age after 2017 will be better off, less than one in ten will be worse off.