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Labour and a growing proportion of Liberal Democrat MPs plan to mount an assault on the acceleration of the state pension age (SPA), Rachel Reeves, shadow pensions minister says.
In a private members' debate on Wednesday, MPs grilled pensions minister Steve Webb on the clause in the Pensions Bill.
MPs called on Webb to reconsider plans to raise the SPA to 66 by 2020 for everyone, meaning some women in their fifties will face a wait of an extra two years before they can claim.
"Labour recognises the longevity rise, and we accept acceleration, but not before 2020," Reeves said after the debate.
"There are too many changes already. As a compromise, we propose raising the SPA to 66 by 2022, saving the government £20bn rather than £30bn."
Reeves said the policy is unpopular amongst Liberal Democrats and hinted at a rebellion at the second reading of the Pensions Bill, which is expected to be in early June.
"The second reading of the Pensions Bill is due very soon and we are hoping to mobilise as much support as possible against the clause on SPA," she said.
"Two Lib Dems spoke against the changes today because those changes were not in the coalition agreement. The government could not find a single Lib Dem MP to speak in favour of the changes today [apart from the minister]."
So far one in five Liberal Democrat MPs have signed an early day motion (EDM) calling on the government to reconsider its state pension reforms.
To date 140 MPs have signed the EDM, with two more having signed yesterday after the debate.
The majority of signatures are Labour but all major parties including the Conservatives are represented in the motion.
Reeves said hundreds of people are writing to their MPs urging them to sign the EDM, and 10,000 people have signed a Unions Together petition against the SPA policy.
Age UK will lobby Parliament on Wednesday 18 May and present the petition to the minister.
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Two years too much!
I am one of the women affected by this proposal which would require me to work 100 weeks extra, that is a month short of 2 more years, on top of the 4 years I have already accepted being added to my state pension age. Most of my working life I expected to retire at 60, then due to the raise in pension age I have expected to retire at 64 since 1995. This threat of a further 2 years is outrageous! I have paid contributions for 42 years already, what is fair about choosing a group of women and exploiting them in this way? Women only slightly older than us retired at 60, how come then we are expected to still be fit enough to work 6 more years? Steve Webb sees us as statistics, but we are individual women with plans for our lives and our retirements, some of us cannot manage financially for 2 more years, some of us cannot manage physically for 2 more years, this is nothing less than robbery and discrimination.Surely right thinking MP's who respect us as women who have done our share of work and realise that this is going too far too fast will vote against this bill.
Posted by: Barbara
Unfair proposal
Thank goodness for the MPs who see women as people and not as statistics. Surely even the Conservative MPs must realise the unfairness of this proposal and vote against it ! The generation of women born 1953/1954 have worked from 15 years of age when there was no equality of wages and no chance to save for a private pension,so they can not retire until they can claim state pension. How can they manage in physically hard jobs to 66 years of age? They shouldn't have to when they were given a date for retirement and assured it wouldn't change.Surely all MPs can see that forcing older people to work longer and pay in contributions when many young people are unemployed, is very unfair.
Posted by: Ruth
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pension changes
Considering pension is a long term investment it does seem ludicrous to make this change at such short notice.The change is increasing from potentially obtaining a pension in 7 years time to 9 years. Most women would even accept receiving the equivilant of job seekers allowance and allowing a young unemployed into the work place (as introduced by M Thatcher in 1982)or is this too simple!
Posted by: Joanne