OVERVIEW

  The Committee has agreed to consider evidence from organizations speaking on behalf of 460,000 frozen expatriate pensioners. There can be no dispute, that this group:

—  is the only group of UK state pensioners which has never received any uprating to their pensions—the most poverty-stricken of all pensioners must be found within this group;

—  receives no supplementary social benefits from the UK, and a large proportion of the poorest receive no, or very limited such benefits from any other government;

—  presents no financial liability to the UK Treasury (neither do they have any expectations) for any of the myriad of other social security/healthcare benefits available to UK residents.

  Many of these pensioners live in countries with no social security net to assist them in their most difficult final years. Examples of such countries are South Africa and Zimbabwe. Many others live in countries where social security benefits available may be quite limited because of shorter periods of residence and/or, in some cases, some degree of means testing. Canada[44] is just one example of countries within this group.

  Although it does not have funds available to undertake comprehensive surveys of frozen pensioners, the World Alliance has started to accumulate a central registry of case histories of frozen pensioners experiencing the severest financial hardship. The specific financial impact of pension freezing on these individuals is clearly defined. The first few of these case histories are summarized as an attachment to this document. The data results from information offered by the individuals and, in most cases, subsequent interviews by volunteer researchers. For obvious reasons, our volunteer researchers did not pursue/interview any of the case histories amongst the 5,500 frozen pensioners living in Zimbabwe.

  The World Alliance feels it is necessary to make the point that in the absence of valid research data to the contrary, it is reasonable to assume that the demographic and socio-economic levels are generally consistent between all UK state pensioners, regardless of their country of residence. However, within those general terms clearly the ever-decreasing, in real terms, UK state pension benefits received by the 54 per cent of expatriate pensioners with frozen pensions, is a major contributor to moving more and more of that group into the ranks of the poverty stricken. Not only do they suffer at least the indignity of such treatment, but over the years, the pension income they have lost has played an increasingly important role in leading them down the road to poverty, to say nothing of the financial pressures brought to bear on relatives and friends as they attempt to make up for the shortfall initiated by Britain, by doing their best to help to keep their elderly relatives away from poverty.

1.  RECOMMENDATION/EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

  The World Alliance of British Expatriate Pensioners (WABEP) recommends:

that the Social Security Select Committee recommend to the Secretary of State that he remove country of residence as a factor determining the amount of state pension paid.

1.1  Rationale

  This would:

1.2  immediately ease clearly the most severe pensioner poverty which is found amongst the identifiable group, (54 per cent of the expatriate pensioners who have always had their pensions frozen) receiving by far the lowest pension benefits; relieve the financial hardship so many more of these expatriate pensioners suffer under the present discriminatory practice, particularly the majority of pensioners who are single women and widows, the more elderly and those residing in countries with little or no social security support

1.3  fulfil the obligation of the UK Government to allocate equal benefits to all pensioners whose required participation in a mandatory pension scheme involved equal contributions

1.4  provide the same pension treatment the government ethically requires and legally demands from private sector employers

1.5  permit many current UK residents heavily reliant on state pensions the freedom to make their own choice to live abroad near their children, if they so desire, without the fear of becoming a financial burden to them

1.6  enable "frozen" pensioners to plan their declining years on a state pension on an equal basis to that of their colleagues with whom they worked, fought and served alongside during their working life in, and service to, Britain

1.7  temper the anger of expatriates, particularly those who responded to prior long-term UK policies of encouraging settlement in Commonwealth countries, only to find themselves becoming, thereby, :victims of UK Government discrimination. Why, for example, they ask are pensions frozen in Canada but not in U.S.A., in Zimbabwe but not Bosnia-Herzegovina, in Trinidad and Grenada but not in Barbados or Jamaica!

1.8  help correct an image of modern Britain, particularly in Commonwealth countries, as ruthlessly opportunistic and callously indifferent

1.9  enable the UK to defend its claim of the best funded contributory state pension scheme in Europe against well-founded allegations that it is the least fair since no other OECD country seeks to minimise expenditure by unfair discrimination

1.10  incur a cost of less than three-quarters of one per cent of the pensions budget.