How moving to be close to my daughter cost me £50,000 of my pension: More than 400,000 pensioners like Anne are missing out… here’s how to know if YOU are one

For her hundredth birthday on December 20, war veteran Anne Puckridge wants more than a cake and a telegram from the king. She wants the government to change its ‘frozen pensions’ policy, giving her the same £72.50-a-week pension she first received when she moved to Canada from Scotland in 2001 to be close to her daughter Diane.

Had she stayed in Britain, her pension would have risen over the years to £169.50 a week, the old state pension for those who retired before 2016. As such, Anne has missed out on £50,000 in pension money.

Yesterday the vulnerable 99-year-old arrived in London after a 7,000-kilometre journey from her home in Calgary, accompanied by Diane, where she will have to lobby MPs to stand up for almost half a million pensioners who find themselves in a similar situation.

Anne is deeply disappointed that Prime Minister Keir Starmer has refused to meet her and will instead meet Pensions Secretary Emma Reynolds.

The retirees she represents live mainly in Canada, Australia and New Zealand and do not benefit from the triple-lock guarantee that sees the British state pension rise each year based on the highest rate of inflation, earnings growth or 2.5 percent.

But because of what Puckridge calls a ‘cruel pension lottery’, pensioners who retired in countries that have reciprocal arrangements with Britain will benefit from the triple lock – and will receive the 4.1 percent increase that British pensioners in due April 2025, taking into account the full state pension for those who retired after 2016 up to £230.25.

These countries include the European Union and the United States, just across the border from Canada.

“It’s outrageous,” Puckridge told The Mail on Sunday. ‘We have spent our entire working lives in Britain paying full national insurance contributions, but because we live in certain countries we don’t get any increases. And we weren’t told that when we moved.”

The Department for Works and Pensions (DWP) website states that pensions will only increase if you live in the European Economic Area, Gibraltar, Switzerland and countries that have social security agreements with Britain (but not Canada or New Zealand ). “You will not receive an annual increase if you live outside these countries,” it says.

But when Puckridge moved, she said she was not told her pension would remain at the same level as the day she left Britain. After serving in the RAF, Navy and Armed Forces in the Second World War, she settled in Aberdeen and taught shorthand and typing as well as computer science until she was 76, all the while paying into National Insurance.

It wasn’t until she moved to Calgary that she realized her pension wasn’t being increased. Despite repeatedly writing to the DWP for information, it was not until 2012 that she was told that the leaflet she had requested was out of print and that she should consult the internet instead.

‘We want something to be done now. With Christmas just around the corner, it’s even more frustrating,” Puckridge said. ‘I don’t just fight for myself. I’m fighting for half a million frozen pensions around the world.’

Edwina Melville-Gray, chairman of the End Frozen Pensions campaign in Canada, is also making the trip to Britain from her home in Toronto. In October, she delivered a letter to Downing Street signed by 150 British and Canadian MPs, including Steven MacKinnon, Canada’s Labor Minister, asking for a reconsideration of the policy.

Melville-Gray said that while 453,000 pensioners in 50 of the 56 Commonwealth countries had their pensions frozen, 650,000 pensioners living abroad would have their pensions increased at the same rate as in Britain. “This is an injustice that must be righted,” she said. ‘One of our gentlemen is 104, and he gets £19 a week, which has been frozen for forty years.’

Edwina Melville-Gray outside 10 Downing Street during her final retirement campaign

Pensions Minister Emma Reynolds will meet Anne Puckridge

Figures from DWP show that it would cost £940m if a policy change were to see a full increase in frozen pensions for 2024-2025, bringing them in line with UK pensions. However, Melville-Gray said the campaign was now asking for a ‘very reasonable ‘uprating forward’ position to give everyone the triple-lock increase from April 2025′. It would cost £55m to apply April’s 4.1 per cent increase to frozen pensions, she said. The costs would be offset by the £2,616 that the campaign says pensioners abroad save the government by not using the NHS or key social services.

“Canada has a social security agreement with Britain, but despite repeated requests from the Canadian government, Britain is refusing to fulfill its part of the reciprocity agreement,” Melville-Gray said. “Canada does not discriminate based on where its retirees live and is giving those living in Britain a full upgrade.”

A government spokesperson said: ‘We are extremely proud of our veterans and their families for the contribution they make to our country. They are the ultimate in public service, and their professionalism and courage are rightly respected around the world. We understand that people move abroad for many reasons, and we provide clear information on how this could impact their pension finances – with the policy of increasing the UK state pension for recipients living abroad being longstanding.”

In 2009, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that it was not discriminatory to exclude pensioners living abroad from increases in their pensions. An appeal the following year was rejected.

Instead of launching a new legal challenge, End Frozen Pensions is increasing pressure on the UK government – ​​Puckridge’s other daughter, Gillian Mittins, 71, has collected 127,000 signatures through her change.org petition calling for a meeting with the Prime Minister . ‘My mother is not immortal. This is a last ditch effort to get justice,” she said.

Gillian is also affected by the policy. After traveling the world and working abroad in her 60s, she says she was forced to settle in Aberdeen rather than somewhere in Thailand because she couldn’t afford to have her pension frozen. “It’s ridiculous that I can live in the Philippines and increase my pension, but not in Thailand or Vietnam,” she said.

Meanwhile, her mother gets an idea of ​​what it’s like to receive her full state pension. During her week’s stay in Britain, she is entitled to the weekly allowance of £169.50 that she would have received if she had remained in Britain. Will she apply? “I certainly will,” she said.