Frozen pensions protest group appeals to UK lawmakers yet again

As British expats living in a number of countries outside the EU are getting older, more and more are finding themselves trapped in ‘pension apartheid’.

The frozen pensions scandal seems to have been hitting the headlines for decades, with not one elected British government able and willing to do anything about it. Cynics might well consider such inexcusable governmental inactivity is spurred by that well-known British phrase, ‘I’m all right, Jack’, with others believing the UK owes nothing to those who’ve decided to leave. It’s easy to forget pensioners overseas have paid in for their less-than-generous state stipend for all their working lives, and are now costing the UK not one penny to maintain.

Australia, still a Commonwealth country with the British Queen as its head, has always been a favourite for Britishers sick to death of the English weather. One such, 98-year old Dela Wilmott, paid national insurance during her entire working life as an office manager. She retired to Australia in 1979 and began drawing her £17 per week state pension. She’s still drawing it – all £17 of it – as Australia is one of 150 countries worldwide where British state pensions are frozen. A total of 548,000 Brit retirees are in the same position, and their numbers are increasing year by year.

Britons choosing to retire to Commonwealth countries and many other worldwide destinations have been financially discriminated against for 70 years. Yes, 70 long years during which successive governments have ignored the issue, even when it concerned soldiers who’d fought for their country in WWII. Many would-be expats are tripped up by this if their research hasn’t alerted them, and many more choose the country they prefer and hope for the best. In extreme cases, elderly Britons are being forced back to a country they’d disliked enough to leave simply because they’ve run out of ready cash.

This unjust, two-tier system has already surfaced in Brexit negotiations due to the fears of expats in Europe that their pensions may be frozen the minute the UK leaves the EU. Fortunately for them, they’re now almost certain to retain their annual upgrades, thus making the plight of those living elsewhere even more egregious. Last week, the protest group International Consortium for British Pensioners arrived at Westminster to make its case to MPs, most of whom were shocked at the revelations. The fact that the NHS saves huge sums every year by not having to treat these citizens in their medically expensive final years of life doesn’t seem to have penetrated the political mentality, and the issue itself denigrates a government already seemingly on its last legs.