Waspi judicial review to be heard in December
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A judicial review claim brought by Women Against State Pension Inequality will be heard in December, with the High Court’s decision expected in spring next year.
The date for the judicial review hearing has been set for 9 and 10 December 2025, when Waspi and the Department for Work and Pensions will present their claim and defence, respectively. The judicial review was secured by Waspi after the DWP refused compensation to 1950s-born women over the department’s delay in communicating a rise in women’s state pension age.
The judge hearing the case cannot order the government to pay compensation, but they can decide that the government's reasons for refusing compensation are not rational, potentially forcing DWP to take the decision about compensation afresh.
On Friday, government lawyers served the DWP’s defence on Waspi’s legal team, which is now preparing a response.
Even though the government has accepted PHSO’s finding of maladministration, it has rejected the recommended compensation at level 4 of PHSO's severity of injustice scale, worth between £1,000 and £2,950 at that point.
Work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall claimed women knew the state pension age was rising, citing a particular survey, and said paying flat rate compensation to all 3.5m women would cost up to £10.5bn.
However, deputy PHSO Karl Bannister told MPs in January that DWP itself at the time knew that women did not know. He also argued that a compensation scheme did not need to cost the maximum projected amount of £10.5bn.
In 2024, PHSO had taken the unusual step of laying its report in parliament so MPs could intervene, as it predicted that ministers would resist compensating women; however, PHSO expressed surprise that the government has not even offered to compensate the women who served as case studies for its report, something that is normally expected.
The government might be taking on a difficult fight, as Waspi has the support of numerous parliamentarians. In the spring, the chair of the Work and Pensions Committee demanded to know from Kendall which compensation schemes DWP had considered before the decision not to provide any. And earlier this year, Stephen Flynn MP (SNP) introduced a private member's bill demanding compensation, saying in parliament that the prime minister and senior cabinet members had promised their support to Waspi women during their 2024 election campaign.
