The WASPI campaign has issued a rallying cry to all of their supporters as they continue their fight for DWP compensation. The group has fought for over a decade to get payouts for the 1950s-born generation of women represented by them and other campaign groups.
They claim this group of women were not properly informed of their state pension age increasing from 60 to 65 and then 66, and that the DWP should pay up for its errors.
Their cause was previously vindicated by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, who said the DWP made major mistakes and should award the women between £1,000 and £2,950 each. Labour announced last year there would be no compensation, but the WASPI campaign had applied for a judicial review of this decision, which was to take place on December 9 and 10.
But Labour ministers announced in November 2025 it would ‘retake’ the decision not to grant compensation, and now the DWP has agreed an out-of-court settlement with WASPI, so the judicial review will not be going ahead. As part of the agreement, the DWP said it will issue a new decision within 12 weeks.
WASPI campaign chair Angela Madden said she was very pleased the Government has committed to this timeframe. She said: “We really didn’t want any more delay.
“Had we had the judicial review, it would take the judge three or four months to decide, based on past similar cases. So it would have been February or March time, and we wanted to have the same timescale we would have got from the court.”
The DWP also agreed to cover some of WASPI’s legal costs, paying out £180,000 to the campaign group. Ms Madden said the settlement is an important step forward, although it would have been a significant victory for the DWP’s previous decision to be overturned at the high court.
She said: “I think to get an unlawful verdict against the Government would have been hugely powerful, in terms of their credibility and the lengths they’ve gone to, to stop WASPI women getting what they deserve, as defined by the Ombudsman. I think that would have been valuable, but I think we can get just as much out of this really.”
Next steps for the WASPI campaign
As they await the Government’s fresh decision, Ms Madden said the campaign has plenty of work to do in the mean time, and she urged people to show their support. She said: “We’re going to spend the next three months doing our damnedest in Parliament, to get MPs on our side.
“We’ve got over half of them already, but we’re going to have a concerted effort in emailing all our MPs and other supporters. We’ve got such a lot of support in this, the force of society is behind us, the National Pensioners Convention are behind us, the unions are behind us.
“We’re not only going to ask WASPI women, we’re going to ask all our supporters, anyone who would like to see us get compensation, to write to their MPs and tell them to impress on the Secretary of State, how many people are in favour of us getting compensation.”