 The next item of business is a member's business debate on motion 3344, in the name of Sandra White, on the Women Against State Pension Inequality campaign. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put, so may I ask those who wish to speak in the debate to press the request-to-speak buttons as soon as possible. I call on Sandra White to open the debate. Around seven minutes, please, Ms White. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Firstly, I would like to thank the Waspy short for what you have just said. Campaigners for all the work that they have done in highlighting this very serious injustice facing women born in the 1950s, and welcome to the Parliament today who are in the gallery. Thank you very much for all the hard work that you have done. This issue, Presiding Officer, which I believe has been debated in Westminster, no less than five times, and raised amazingly 44 times affects hundreds of thousands of women, and yet the situation remains the same. No one disagrees that there should be equalisation with the state pension. What we do disagree with and what is so damaging is the way that the changes have been implemented. Accelerating the Pensions 2011 act timetable for women's state pension aged from 63 to 65 between April 2016 and November 2018, and from 65 to 66 by October 2020 is not only unjust but is causing severe financial and emotional hardship for women cut up in this legislation, and it gives no time at all to replan for retirement. To illustrate the impact of the changes, I have some personal stories which women have sent and shared with me, and I would like to share them with the members here today and the gallery also. This is one lady's story. Due to life circumstances, I was unable to join the superannuation until 2004. In 2005, I received a letter stating that I would not be eligible for my pension until I reached the age of 66. Non-communication is a huge issue in this particular problem. I have worked for the NHS since 1986 and paid my national insurance since I was 16. In 2014, I developed pancreatic cancer. I have since undergone surgery and chemotherapy and I have no doubt that it will return. Therefore, I had to leave my post with the NHS and retire early due to my ill health, and I fear by the time at each age of 66 it will be sadly too late for me to even receive my pension that I paid in diligently for 40 years. Another lady tells me that my own story is that I was born in mid-October 1954, and I have worked since I was 15. Then, six months before I was 60, I contracted viral meningitis. I decided not to be a burden to my employer and take my retirement. It was only after the paper was signed that my sister, who volunteers for CAB informed me that I would not get my state pension until I was 66. I have paid 43 years national insurance and I feel that this is a total injustice that I have to wait—not 18 months, but an extra six years—to get my state pension. Other ladies sent in emails and letters, spoke to them also, and I will just dip into that. It would not be so diligent in putting forward their whole story. Women have been forced to take jobs that are inappropriate to their state of health to qualify for limited jobseekers allowance, and then, during humiliating tests, otherwise, they face sanctions. Forced to take jobs that place them in a worse financial situation, particularly in zero-hour contracts—this is one that is a very important one, this next lady who sent this in to me. Single, divorced or widowed women often have no other sources of income. That is something that is completely ignored by the Westminster Government and the DWP in the pension issue. Another issue that I am sure lots of us know about is that women are unable to work as they care for elderly ill parents or, in fact, ill health themselves. Those are all affected. Women who have planned and saved for their retirement are living on dwindling limited savings until they reach their new state pension age. When the only income that they will have left will be their state pension. We, the SNP, commissioned the Land and Economics report into the impact of the changes to pension arrangements. That report identifies an affordable solution that would slow down that increase in order to give adequate time for women affected by the acceleration to make alternative arrangements. The UK Government has rejected both the report and the recommendations, despite the fact that those measures would alleviate very difficult financial situations for women across the country. That would be a much more rational proposal for the equalisation of state pension, which is in stark contrast to basically the bulldozing action taken by the UK Government and only further illustrates the disregard for women affected by those changes. My colleagues and others in Westminster will continue to push the Tory Government on this, and I and others will do all that we can, as I hope members and I am sure they will, across the chamber will absolutely fight for the rights of those women. More importantly, the WASP women, whom we have mentioned before, will continue to fight this injustice, and they will have all of our support in this. The Conservatives have ducked their responsibility to the WASP women for too long, and it is really time to face up to reality. Pensions are not a privilege—you must remember that. Pensions are not a privilege. They are a contract, and the UK Government has broken that contract. These women have paid into that contract when they were working, and it has now been broken. The Land and Economics report, which I have already mentioned, proves that the Tory's figures are wrong, and that the UK Government can afford to write the wrong that they have done to the WASP women. The UK Government has rejected both the report and its recommendations, despite the fact that those measures would go on some way in alleviating very difficult financial situations for women across the country. We already know that the National Insurance Fund surplus is projected to be over £30 billion—£30 billion, Presiding Officer—at the end of 2017-2018. Instead of sitting on this hefty pot, the UK Government must consider releasing £8 billion—£8 billion from £30 billion—to alleviate the plight of the women of the 1950s. That progressive approach will cost the UK Government significantly less, and more importantly will reduce relative and absolute pension poverty for the women of the 1950s. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Can I ask our visitors in the gallery to refrain from clapping, please? I'll happily give you the opportunity at the end of the debate. I now move on, please, to Annie Wells, to be followed by Gail Ross. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and thanks to Sandy White for bringing this issue to the chamber today. With a mother who at the age of 72 has just gone from working 24 hours a week to a still impressive 17 hours a week at a local supermarket, I can understand first hand some of the financial pressures women can face at retirement age. That is a really difficult situation, as I strongly believe that people who have worked hard all their life deserve security in their retirement. In 1995, the legislation to equalise the age at which women would be eligible to draw their state pension made raising the age for women from 60 to 65, a process that was intended to be done gradually between 2010 and 2020. Unfortunately, however, owing to life expectancy projections rising sharply ahead of initial suggestions, the pensions act 2011 provided for the acceleration of the equalisation, meaning that this process would be completed by November 2018, rather than originally intended in April 2020. In 2011, listening to concerns at the time, the UK Government capped the maximum increase to 18 months relative to the 1995 timetable, representing a £1.1 billion concession. I think that it is important to highlight that concession. However, I still understand the concerns of the women who have been affected after meeting with Glasby members from Glasgow over the past few months. Although many were sympathetic to the idea that the state pension age should be equalised, it was the speed of change and the perceived lack of communication over the timetable changes that concerned them most, the latter of which was supported by the works and pensions select committee last year. The issue has been debated, as we all know in the UK Parliament, on a number of occasions, and the all-party parliamentary group was set up, especially to address the public's concerns. At this point, in what has been an on-going issue for many years, my course of action will be to write to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to echo the concerns that we hear here in the chamber today. The key points will include the concerns over changes that have been communicated despite the UK Government's insisting. I thank Annie Wells for taking that intervention. It is very laudable that she says that she will write to the Westminster Government to express some of her concerns, but what other action are her and her party going to take so that there is some justice for the women who are sitting in the gallery today? As I said, as it is a reserved matter, what I can do is write on what has happened in the chamber tonight, which I absolutely intend to do so. I will put down the concerns on how the changes have been communicated, despite the UK Government insisting that women were given between five and a half and six and a half years. I know from meeting waspy members that that has not been the case. That is going to be part of what I put in my letter. I will also highlight some information that I have received from the waspy women in Glasgow, the unique position that Glasgow sees itself, because life expectancy rates are lower than that of the rest of the UK. Whatever comes out here, I will put that forward, and I hope to communicate more with the waspy women on that. I know that that will come with little reassurance to some affected, but I still reiterate that some positive changes have taken place in regard to the state pension. I know that that will come as it does not help if you have not got your state pension, and I know people who have not received their state pension. However, we need to look at the state pension triple lock, which was introduced in 2010, that holders are now in a seat of more than £1,000 a year more. The new state pension has been introduced at a single flat rate of £155.65 per week. That will equate to an average of £8 per week more in the first 10 years for thousands of Scottish women. I would like to finish by reiterating that beyond the positive steps that we have seen regarding the state pension, I understand the concerns of the women who are affected by changes to the state pension age, and I would like to reassure the members of waspy who sat here in the chamber today and elsewhere that I will make their concerns known. Gail Ross, to be followed by Rona Mackay. I feel very privileged to be able to take part in this debate, and I thank Sandra White for bringing this very important topic to the chamber. I would also like to welcome our waspy guests to the gallery as well. Of course, we should not have to debate this, and I do not feel that I should be standing here about to recount stories from women that I know that feel let down and left behind by this Government in Westminster. It is all very well for a member of the Scottish Conservatives to stand up and explain what the current pension is. It is no good if you are not getting it. Presiding Officer, I am 39 years old, and I must admit that I did not really think about my pension and did not give it as much consideration as I probably should have done. I do now. Mary Black MP is 22 years old, and I dare say that she has put a lot more thought into pensions in the past two years than she normally would have as well. It is at this point that I should perhaps declare an interest, as this change also affects my own mother, who is a proud waspy woman. The waspy campaign has reached all parts of the UK, and I am proud to say that two feisty women from my part of the world, Aileen Shanks and Lorna Simpson, have been instrumental in representing women's views in the far north. They went to the demonstration in London last June, and they presented a petition to the House of Commons in October with over 2,000 signatures from Caithness alone. They are also urging women affected to write formal letters of complaint to the DWP. The 8 March is International Women's Day, and this again will see thousands of people descend on Westminster to demonstrate that they are determined. I think that in debates like this it is powerful, as Sandra White has already done to provide real-life examples. One woman told me that I was always under the impression that I could retire at 60, so I decided to change jobs to a less stressful position with another organisation. I was working for a long hours, I had a huge amount of responsibility, and I knew that I had to look for something less stressful for health reasons. I took a huge drop in salary, which meant that I was more than willing to do. Unfortunately, I then found out that I would not be able to retire until 10 days of my 66th birthday. I was informed of the changes to state pension age when I was 58 years old and was absolutely stunned as clearly my expectation would be that I would only have two years to go before receiving it. As I was only given two years' notice of the change, it left little time to plan for my retirement. Another woman worked as a cook and took early retirement, receiving a very small pension from her employer. She then found out that she would not receive her pension again months of her 66th birthday. She is now living on a very small pension and she struggles day to day. Her husband is on a low income. She has absolutely no chance. She feels of finding another job at her age. Another lady works as a cleaner in the public sector. She has health problems and she is very worried how she will manage working in this field for the next three and a half years. Her job is very physical and it is a real struggle, added to the worry of how she is going to cope. She lives on her own, pays full rent but only earns just over minimum wage. Mary Black said of finding the money for pensions. When we want to bomb Syria, we find it. When we want to refurbish Westminster, we find it. But when it comes to giving our pensions their pensions, we cannot do it. I just do not accept that whatsoever. I neither do I. First of all, I would like to thank my colleague Sandra White for her extensive campaigning on behalf of the Wasby campaign group and for bringing this debate forward. As Sandra said, the Conservative Westminster Government increased the retirement age for women to 65 in 1995 into 66 in 2011. The UK Government has shamefully admitted that the first time it wrote to women informing them of those changes was between April 2009 and March 2011, over 15 years after the 1995 Pensions Act. This is a disgraceful failure that has destroyed the retirement plans of thousands of women born in the 1950s, leaving them with little time to amend plans for their future that they are regarded as safe. With just two years' notice, many women have lost as much as 36,000 of the pension they would have had if they had been able to retire as planned. This might not matter to the people of inherited wealth who make these decisions or highly paid civil servants with huge pension pots, but for hundreds of thousands of hard-working women in Scotland and throughout the UK, it is devastating. It shows just how out of touch this Westminster Government is. More than 4,000 women in eastern Bartenshire, where my constituency lies, are affected. That is nothing short of daylight robbery by the UK Government. As my colleague Sandra White says, pensions are not a privilege. The Wasby campaign agrees with the equalisation of pensions. However, the core of the campaign's argument is the unfair and unjust way that these changes were implemented, as so articulately highlighted by my Westminster colleague, Mary Black, who has waged a valiant fight on behalf of the women affected. SNP MPs have raised the issue at least 44 times in the House of Commons and commissioned independent research by Landman Economics, which was to be described as a useful first step in showing the UK Government that, despite its statements to the contrary, money is available in the national insurance fund for 1950s women's pensions. Wasby has raised awareness of this injustice and championed the thousands of women born in the 1950s affected by this lack of notification and change to their pension status. Although the financial implications of this can be measured, the emotional implications of the stress of how to make ends meet are immeasurable. Much needs to be done to slow down the increase, allowing women to access their pension, more time to change their retirement plans and to alleviate pension poverty. Currently, there are 140 Wasby local groups, over 30 local and county councils passing resolutions supporting the campaign and unison pledges support for Wasby at a national level. The UK Government needs to move away from its increasingly isolated stance on this and recognise those calls from across parties, local authorities and organisations to rectify this injustice. Hardworking women deserve respect and access to their own money that they had planned their future on. Jackie Baillie, followed by Angus MacDonald. Presiding Officer, let me start by congratulating Sandra White on securing this debate and indeed for the content of her speech. I also want to offer an apology to the chamber from Kezia Dugdale, leader of the Scottish Labour Party. She had intended to speak in this debate but, unfortunately, she had a funeral to attend. I know how important this issue is to the women affected because I have heard many similar stories from women in my constituency. However, you know that it is important for us all because it is fundamentally for me a matter of fairness and justice. It is good to see so many women from the Wasby movement in the public gallery this evening. The equalisation of the state pension age has had a devastating impact on many women who were born in the 1950s, some of whom are now facing real hardship as a result. At some 2.6 million women across the UK, 252,000 women in Scotland, the scale is enormous. They have not been able to plan for their retirement. They were not given notice of such sweeping changes and, frankly, they should not have to bear the brunt of Tory mismanagement. It is genuinely interesting that Governments will talk about things such as transitional relief when they are discussing business rates. If we can have transitional relief for the rateable value of buildings, then surely we can have relief for women, too. Many of those women have worked all their lives and made immense contributions to their community in all sorts of different ways. Instead of robbing them of security in their retirement, the UK Government would be well thanking them for everything that they have done. In 2011, in Duncan Smith, remember him, made a commitment to look at transitional reliefs to help the women who have been hit hardest by the changes. He did not make good on his promises. Neither did any of his successors. No wonder politicians—indeed, particularly Tory politicians—get such a bad name. We, on this side of the chamber, have repeatedly argued for transitional arrangements. Labour suggested an initial proposal, allied to pension credit, then expanded that to include a cohort of women, born between April 1951 and 1953, but we recognised that we needed to deal with all waspy women. It is right that the fight continues. Our colleagues in Labour and the SNP have worked together on that at Westminster, and I look forward to that continuing. The reality is that many women have been forced to accept low-paid jobs. Many women have been forced to accept temporary or zero-hours contracts. Others who had retirement plans, perhaps to look after grandchildren or elderly parents, have had those plans shattered. It is simply not fair. Scottish Labour pledges, as others have done, to stand full square in support of their cause. Let me turn briefly to the powers that we have in Scotland. The Parliament now has the power to top up benefits or, indeed, to create new benefits in devolved areas. Although I am absolutely not in favour of letting the Tory Government off the hook, I am concerned that we do not miss the practical opportunity to help the women affected here in Scotland. I hope that, if that time comes, if we do not win that argument with an uncaring Tory Government, the Scottish Government will consider using its new powers to ensure that women do not have to suffer. Just when you thought that things could not get any worse, along comes the consultation on the concessionary bus pass. I have been contacted by a number of women in my constituency who are genuinely concerned, and they have asked me to raise it this evening. Let me say as gently as I can to ministers. Let us not penalise women any more by changing the qualifying age for concessionary travel. I hope that that does not happen, but if it does, we are collectively no better than the Tory Government in making it even harder for the same cohort of women. Let us all of us send a strong signal today that we would regard that as unacceptable. Women and men across this chamber are irrespective of the party that you belong to. Let me thank Sandra White again for a very thoughtful and powerful speech. Just before I call Mr Macdonald, I am aware that quite a lot of people still want to contribute to this debate, so I am content to take a motion without notice to extend this debate by up to 30 minutes. That would be under rule 8.14.3 if that were moved by a member. Is the chamber agreed that we should extend the debate up to 30 minutes? I am pleased about that, because I think that there is quite a lot of people in the gallery. It would not be if you said no, and therefore the debate is extended. I now call Angus Macdonald to be followed by Alison Johnstone. I thank my colleague Sandra White for bringing this important issue to the chamber for debate and being fully aware of just how important it is to so many of our constituents. Having been contacted by many constituents in Falkirk East on the issue of state pension equalisation, the personal stories convey a feeling of utter disbelief and at times devastation as to how women born in the 1950s had been unfairly and unjustly treated by the UK Government. Over recent years, this has been an issue that has been met with the stone faces of a Tory Government and Westminster who seem to be oblivious to the impact that this is having on thousands of women up and down the country who were completely unaware that those changes were to be made. As has already been acknowledged, state pension equalisation is a move that has been widely accepted—that is certainly not in question. It is the fact that those changes are being imposed unfairly. What this boils then to is the fact that those changes were not effectively communicated and, in the majority of cases, they were not communicated at all to the women who will be severely impacted if something is not done to mitigate the pace of change. The landmine economics report that has been referred to earlier, commissioned by our colleagues in the SNP Westminster group, not only strikes a compromise in the pace that those reforms are implemented, but it takes a common sense approach that women who have paid into the system and for over 30 years—some of them over 40 years—are not disproportionately disadvantaged and left with a financial void that they did not expect when planning for their retirement. The single-tier pension is not the focus of this debate, but the fact remains that there are more women over 65 than men, yet only 22 per cent of women who reached state pension age in 2016 will qualify for the full £155.65 rate. That cannot be acceptable. Even by 2054, women will be one and a half times more likely than men to receive less than the full amount of the single-tier pension due to a lack of sufficient qualifying years. Removing pension entitlements with little notice or time to plan for the real change will disadvantage many women who will not have had time to achieve the financial stability required in order to ensure that they are not put into a dire position through no fault of their own. Many women have made decisions based on the understanding that their state pension would be payable in due at 60, but that is not now the case. Waspy has been instrumental in allerting everyone to the issue, and I pay tribute to the work that we have done to highlight the issue. The anxieties that are expressed by thousands of women do not affect just that age group, however. They also affect younger people in their 40s who are extremely concerned that their pension age, which is nearly 70, could be extended once again. It has been proven time and time again that the UK Government is unwilling to consider any suggestion or compromise, reasoned or otherwise, on several issues, but particularly on the issue. Despite the Landman report, and I have a copy of it here, I am offering five separate options as solutions. It beggars belief that, of the times that this has been debated in the houses of Parliament in Westminster, we have heard the same old tune from the Tory Government that this is about equalisation, that they will not repeal the 1995 Pensions Act, which no one has actually asked them to do, and that they will not be held accountable as this is an issue that has had its moment in the spotlight. However, it is for those precise reasons that the Waspie campaigners have ensured that this issue was kept on the radar, and we as a representative should continue to press for the necessary changes. The minister will be aware that my own local authority debated the issue at length in Falkirk quite recently at a full council meeting with the ruling Labour Tory administration calling for the Scottish Government to compensate those women affected by the changes to their state pension age. Members of the administration in Falkirk should have known, as should Jackie Baillie, that the Scottish Government does not have the power to pay a pension to women who have not reached the UK pension age. However, had the UK Government seen fit to transfer the necessary powers over pensions to the Scottish Parliament under the recent Scotland Act, perhaps the Scottish Government would have been able to take a different approach and would have ensured that those women were given the fair treatment that they so rightly deserve. Once again, the best chance that we have is to ensure that the voices of those affected continue to be heard and that the issue continues to be a thorn in the side of an increasingly arrogant and out-of-touch UK Tory Government. I, too, would like to thank Sandra White for securing a debate on this really important issue and for her contribution and those of colleagues this evening. I was proud to speak at the Waspie rally held outside the Parliament in September. I think that it is remarkable that a campaign that started from five women getting together in 2015 has gathered such strength. The petitions have been well supported, debates well attended, the website attracts great interest, there are over 140 local groups and it shows that that is an issue that people care passionately about. Those petion changes are unjust and they are simply indefensible. Before and since that rally, many constituents have got in touch with me to explain how the changes are going to affect them. Sandra White touched on some of those, but a constituent this week told me that her pension age went from 60 to 64.5 and then to 66 basically without notice. It is entirely unacceptable to introduce such devastating change without giving people an opportunity to plan. The decent thing would have been to delay. Women are quite accepting of equalisation but it has to be done in a fair and balanced manner. Many of the women affected made a choice to raise children and, as a result, they made financial sacrifices in terms of time spent out of employment and now their financial needs are being sacrificed again. Those changes are being made against a backdrop of severe inequality. Pensioner poverty, we know, continues to affect women disproportionately due to maternity leave, parental responsibilities, the pay gap and other aspects of workplace inequality. Let us not forget that until the 1990s, many women were not even allowed to join company pension schemes. While the issue affects women born in the 1950s in particular, it has an incredibly serious impact on us all. It erodes public trust in pensions, it damages public confidence in our social security system and, as others have said, how can young people today be expected to feel secure about their financial future when such erratic changes can be swept through without any warning or consultation? Pensions are reserved to Westminster, but it is important that it is crucial that we debate those changes here. I am one of those who would like to see pensions devolve to Scotland. We know that Scotland has specific demographic challenges and that there is a lower life expectancy here in Scotland compared to the rest of the UK. We have to challenge that, too, but the UK Government has attempted to justify raising the pension age by saying that we are all living longer—well, we are not all living longer—in many parts of this country, people are not living long enough. In the most deprived areas, people begin to suffer multiple chronic diseases at shockingly young ages. On average, women in Scotland are only expected to enjoy good health until the age of 62. There is the wider social impact that those changes will have. Most carers in Scotland are women, and most carers are aged between 55 and 64. A significant number of carers will be affected by those changes. If women over 60 are forced to work for longer, then who is going to take on the additional caring responsibilities? Lots of other women who counted on leaving work at 60 planned to help their families with childcare needs. Those unfair changes are going to leave other working parents, most likely women, without vital family support, so gender inequality continues to cascade down the generations. It is fair to say that austerity is gendered. Of the £26 billion of cuts from Westminster since 2010, a staggering £22 billion has been felt by women. Almost every Westminster Government action that you examine has had a strongly negative impact on women or a relatively beneficial impact on men. Do not take my word for a look at the highly respected women's budget group who highlight that fact. I am delighted that Westminster is taking an interest in this. The new cross-party group that has been set up to look at this attracted 120 MPs at its first meeting. Our sister party in Westminster is represented there with Caroline Lucas as a vice-chair, so this issue is not going to go away. We are not simply going to sit back and be quietly reasonable. We are going to continue to contest this until we have fair pension rights for women. Clare Haughey, to be followed by Alison Harris. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I, too, would like to add my thanks to Sandra White for bringing this debate and to welcome those in the gallery today, the waspy women, including those from my constituency of Rutherglen. I have to start off by saying, unfortunately, that I did not hear any positive steps from the Tories that Annie Wells spoke of in her speech, but I will read back and see if I have missed something. It is estimated that 243,000 women in Scotland have and will be affected by the change in women's pensions. As many have already said, we do not object to the equalising of pension ages between men and women, and neither does the waspy campaign. What we oppose is the ill-thought-out decision that has resulted in hundreds of thousands of women enduring significant changes that were imposed on them with a lack of appropriate notification. Anne Potter, the waspy co-ordinator for Glasgow and Lanarkshire, argued that those born in the 1950s are angry. They feel persecuted and singled out as the soft targets for the Government to save money. That reflects the opinions of many women who have had their retirement plans obliterated with overwhelming consequences. New analysis suggests that individuals in the poorest households lose most from tax and benefit changes, and it also suggests that single mothers are hardest hit by cuts to services and tax and benefit changes. Simply put, women's lives do not mirror those of men. Differing working patterns, priorities and attitudes to savings have an important role to play in the discrepancy between male and female retirement planning. So, to be a woman expecting to retire at 60, only to be told with little notice that you must work an extra six years is crushing, particularly if you have contributed for over 40 years. It is even more calamities if you had poor health and you were now expected to struggle on regardless. One of my constituents, Susan, is in exactly that position. Having started work at the age of 15 in a local factory, Susan eventually became a nurse. She got married and raised a family and studied for and earned a master's degree and changed her career. In a demanding job during her 50s, she has suffered from ill health, a debilitating condition that can result in seizures. The condition is managed with medication, but a regular side effect is chronic fatigue. Effectively, she has to take prescription drugs to enable her to continue working. Susan had been looking forward to retirement last year at 60, but now she must work until 66. She is fearful that her health may not hold up, but with no pension at 60, she must continue to work for an income. A fair transition arrangement could have offered her the prospect of perhaps an additional two or three years working instead of six. That is not exactly the best circumstances, but it would at least have offered some improvement on the current arrangements. It cannot be right or fair that, after 45 years paying into the system, Susan and many other women are now expected to work and contribute for up to 51 years and may lose up to £40,000 pension income in the process. It is also important to note that the increase of the state pension age also has multi-generational effects while older women continue to work, fewer jobs will be made available to younger generations and, as we have heard, it will impact on their caring arrangements, too. As Sandra White previously mentioned in her open speech, an independent report commissioned by the SNP found that it would cost £8 billion to return to the original timetable set out in the 1995 Pensions Act. Rather than spending £7 billion on upgrading the palace of Westminster, or the £8.4 billion that was spent on the Iraq war, or the £167 billion that we are going to spend on trident renewal, surely Westminster could find £8 billion easily to prioritise for women's pension and their economic advancement. At the very least consideration could be given to equalising the pension age at some later point in the 2020s. The SNP has raised this issue 44 times in the House of Commons, brought forth three debates on it at Westminster and even commissioned its own research, as I mentioned. Yet, as a result of an action and an indifference that the issue persists, that inaction indicates that women's lives and their economic security are viewed as disposable or non-essential, and that this cannot continue. To ensure women's economic safety, the Government must develop fair transition arrangements for all women born on or after 6 April 1951, who have had to bear the undue burden of the state pension age increase. I call Alison Harris to be followed by Kenneth Gibson. Thank you. I am pleased to speak this afternoon on this subject. I believe that all people having worked hard throughout their lives should be able to look forward to a financially secure retirement. Many people assist in achieving that goal by private pension plans, often taken out as early in their 20s, whilst others, quite rightly, look forward to state pensions after working lives paying taxes. I say straight away that this means that I acknowledge and appreciate the anger that many feel at the way that pension changes came in. Our starting point is understanding the situation that women affected find themselves in. From that starting point, I think that there are a number of important contexts to the change that all in this chamber should recognise. The first is that the overall policy ambition for a secure retirement surely cannot be questioned. The UK Government has applied a triple lock to the basic pension, which has led to increases in the amount payable, leading to the introduction of a flat rate pension for all those reaching retirement age after April 2016. I would like to continue with those points, please. All women affected by the 2011 pension age changes will draw their state pension under the new system. That will mean that tens of thousands of Scottish women will receive an average of £8 per week more in the first 10 years. The second context is how the changes came in, and that is an issue that stretches back many years. The Pensions Act 1995 legislated for equality in the state pension age to be done gradually after 2010. Following the sharp increase in life expectancy projections, the process had to be accelerated by the Pensions Act 2011 to secure the sustainability of the system. At this time, the UK Government responded to concerns and, as a result, put in another £1.1 billion to assist those affected by the transition to the higher state pension age. No, I would like to continue, please. I've got four minutes. We have to acknowledge that this arbitrary change caused anger, but I also believe that we have to acknowledge that some transitional relief has already been introduced and that the maximum increase was capped at 18 months relative to the 1995 timeline. The final context in the manner of communication is the manner of communication with those affected. The issue of the notice given about the changes arising from the 1995 and 2011 acts have been a source of much discussion. The Department of Work and Pensions is clear that all those affected were written to well in advance of the acts coming into effect. However, I know that concerns over the changes will come with anything that requires people to work longer. People felt they didn't see it coming, people felt shocked and surprised and I have heard what has been said in the chamber tonight. In turn, I believe that all politicians have a duty to be open with the public. Last week, we saw a number of MPs supporting the Waspie groups who said that they would move amendments in the House of Commons. They failed to do so, citing procedural issues. We also have to see that, with rapid demographic change and an ageing society, further support would come at a significant cost and that that would inevitably mean reductions in spending elsewhere. Reversing the changes of the 2011 act would cost more than Scotland's entire annual budget. The issues that underpin the pension changes are deep and complex questions for our society, and no-one wins if we seek to duck those challenges. I will always support the right of people to express their disagreement with policies of either of Scotland's two Governments. In line with my colleague Annie Wells, I will also write to the DWP ministers to communicate the strength of feeling that is clear in this chamber and beyond. I thank Sandra White for bringing forward this debate. I would first like to thank my colleague Sandra White for securing this debate on an important issue for thousands of my constituents and their families. A basic point identifies the most obvious and fundamental flaw with UK Tory Government policy towards waspy women. The state pension is not a benefit as such. It is a contract between those contributing towards their retirement and a Government obligation to make payments from state funds at the end of an individual's working life. We accept that male and female retirement ages should be equalised, but to move the goalpost for women born in the 1950s already contracted with the state on set terms for the pension provision is a clear breach of the contract. Indeed, it is a betrayal of responsibility by the UK Government towards women, many of whom now find themselves completely unsupported financially. The UK Government's 1995 pension act outlined plans to equalise the state pension age to 65. When the legislation was passed, the Turner commission recommended that women were given 15 years' notice to help prepare for the changes. However, the first letters from the UK Government to alert affected women born between April 1951 and April 1953 were not posted until 14 years later. Some women received as little as a year's notice while thousands received no warning at all and were completely unaware that their retirement age was to be changed. The 2011 Pensions Act accelerated the timetable with women now seeing a rise in pensionable age from 63 to 65 between April 2016 and November 2018 and from 65 to 66 by October 2020. For many women affected, there is no alternative means of income. Some suffering from ill health and unfit to work are being told that they need to continue employment or retrain. If the women affected £3,800, residing my cunning up north constituency, and if those raising their voice in opposition to the Tory's ill thought out plans none have been more vocal than the women against state pension inequality. I, too, was proud to stand alongside Wasby women at the rally last September outside this Parliament and I paid tribute to their collective efforts to keep the issue at the top of the political agenda. Local groups such as Ayrshers have engaged with politicians on many fronts, and at least one Ayrshire Wasby member, Margaret Johnson, is in the gallery today. I am delighted that, last October, North Ayrsharnarn MP Patricia Gibson was able to present a petition opposing the changes to Westminster on the group's behalf with 2,534 signatures from North Ayrsharnarn and Arran constituency, the second highest number from any UK constituency and collected in only eight days, indicating the strength of feeling. Wasby campaigners now intend to take the DWP to court and challenge the legality of the proposed changes through a disher review and make maladministration complaints. I wish them well. Of course, there should be no need for such a campaign. A report by alignment economics commission by the Scottish National Party emerald five different reform options for compensating women who will lose out from the planned changes. One option is a return to the original timetable set out in the 95 act, whereby the women's state pension age rises from 63 in March 2016 to 65 by April 2020, with no further increase to 66 until the mid 2020s. The cost of that would be eight billion, not their only 30 billion, often claimed by the Tories when trying to avoid their responsibility. Indeed, there are a ton of responsibilities of the 37 MSPs who signed today's motion to allow this debate to take place. Not one was a Tory, so it was up to them. We wouldn't even be debating that. The national insurance fund is projected to have a surplus of £30.7 billion this year. That can only be used to make contribution-based payments such as a state pension. What is shocking is that Jackie Baillie cynically has tried to imply that somehow the SNP Government is complicit in that. When we all know, the Scotland Act prevents the Scottish Government from acting, even if resources were available. Of course, the source of such resources was body-swerved by Jackie Baillie, desperate to let the Tories off the hook. No wonder her party is in terminal decline. The Tories' refusal to give way in this issue is based on ideology, not affordability. In the interests of social justice, they must compensate those women whose own money is effectively being stolen from them. I now call on Jeane Freeman to wind up this debate around seven minutes, please minister. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Let me start too by thanking Sandra White for bringing this important motion to Parliament today and to extend in my own best wishes to the waspy women who have joined us in the gallery, and particularly, of course, I have to say this to those from Ayrshire. Can I also thank all the members who took part in the debate for their thoughtful contributions? However, I have to say that I am saddened by the fact that our colleagues in the Conservative benches to my left, at least geographically, continue to feel obliged to be apologists for their Tory Government. It really is time when someone talks about the importance of honesty in politics, for that honesty to be reflected in an understanding and an accurate description of what has happened to these women and what the Tory Government has done. I have no hesitation in supporting this motion. The women caught up in this mess, grew up as I did, believing that they had a two-way deal with the UK Government. Sandra White brought to life many of the circumstances that those women face, as did other colleagues in terms of real stories that have been brought to them as members of this Parliament. The women involved have raised families, cared for those who needed it, worked, paid taxes and national insurance, and rightly expected to have returned to them a state pension of a modest but livable amount. To be clear, in principle the Scottish Government supports equalisation of pension age for men and women, but in doing that the UK Government has managed to penalise hundreds of thousands of women born in the 1950s. To recap, the 1995 pensions act aimed to make the pension age 65 for men and women by, and this is the important point, 2020. The 2011 act changed that to 66 and sped up the process, despite little evidence that we had all suddenly started to live longer in those 16 years, or the promise from both Conservative and Liberal Democrat ministers in 2010 that changes would not take place before that 2020 date. Not content with that, women now face the imposition of apparently random differences in how much later the pension that they have contributed to will arrive. A woman born in January 1953 will get her state pension when she is 62. A woman born after 6 December of the same year will have to wait until she is 65. Only in the parallel universe of a Tory Government in Westminster could a few months younger mean that you wait three years longer. Why is that happening? That is not about equalisation, it is not about fairness, it is entirely about reducing public expenditure. Public expenditure because of a Tory Government's thoroughdom to austerity economics to make those least responsible pay for the proliferation of riches for the few and the mad casino gambling of minimally regulated banks, which successive Tory and Labour Governments foisted upon us. Major changes to the life plans and life chances of those women, which the Westminster Government did so very little to tell them about, and a series of broken promises kept under wraps for as long as possible. No warning of impact, no exhortation to review retirement plans, nothing. A work impensions committee report last year, full of statements of the blindingly obvious, that communication was poor, that lessons have to be learned, but action redress nothing. These are women who grew up in a time when full-time work and raising a family was even harder than it is now. Childcare was scarce, most work part-time and still do, and we know that whether in full or part-time work, the vast majority will work for low pay and in far too many cases for lower pay than their male colleagues. Now, those women, their retirement plans shattered, have to try to continue to work, coping with the loss of years of pension that they were entitled to, and were right to expect. However, more than the financial anxieties, it is also the loss of valuable years that they plan to spend with family and friends, and all the while are burning justifiable sense of injustice. Yet here is the thing, those women are not powerless. They have found their voice, and like women everywhere, they are organised and organising. For that, the Waspie movement is to be congratulated and commended. In Westminster, our SNP MPs, as has been said, commissioned the land report, which considered and costied those five different options for the UK Government to consider. Options to consider in a way that would deliver some fairness and dignity if you politically chose to do so. It is about political choice. £8 billion is money that could and should be spent. Not only is it there, as has been pointed out in terms of alternative spending plans, that would be better used in this direction, but on the basis of the surplus that is already in the national insurance fund, expected to be, as my colleague said, £30.7 billion by 2018. Last summer, Angela Constance, our cabinet secretary, wrote to Stephen Crabb, the then Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, urging him to consider his Government's assertion that nothing could be done. His response, and I quote, the UK Government has no plans to revisit these changes. So to Annie Wells I say, good luck with your letter, Annie. I hope you get a better response than we do, but I wouldn't hold my breath. These are women, around 250,000, who were trying to plan for their retirement, to put away for a rainy day when the goalposts were shifted and the ground was snatched from under their feet. It is not too late for the UK Government to right this wrong. They should take responsibility for the heartbreak and misery that they are causing and find the ways and means to provide transitional protection. To Jackie Baillie I say this, I am not prepared to let the Tory Government off the hook. Even if I was, section 28 of the Scotland Act, Exceptions to Reserved Areas, where we can top up but does not include pensions, assistance or by reason of old age, no I won't. The Waspie campaign will continue this fight for fair transitional arrangements and it should have our support, not only today, but in every day and in every way that it needs that support, and on 8 March, when it organises its International Women's Day demonstration outside Westminster. It should never be too much to ask when all you ask for is honesty, decency, fairness and integrity, and I urge all members to support Sandra White's motion, the Waspie campaign, and to pledge to continue our hard work to see this decision reversed. I close this meeting and the gallery may show their appreciation now if they wish.