Mothers who don’t get state pensions WILL get them, as the solution to the child benefit debacle is finally revealed

Mothers who have missed out on valuable state pension credits can claim them from April 2026, the government has announced.

This is Money has campaigned for years for fair treatment for parents who are not eligible for child benefit but who stand to lose tens of thousands of pounds in old age if they do not claim it.

The government now says its solution will cover all affected parents, going back to the 2013 child benefit overhaul after finally abandoning its defense of current state pension rules last spring.

Hardly anyone knows that there is a connection between child benefit and how much AOW you can receive in decades.

Many new moms and dads told us they had no idea this innocent misunderstanding about obscure child support rules could cost them a lot of money in retirement.

Former Pensions Secretary Steve Webb, who lobbied with This is Money to give mothers their credit, said today: ‘It is vital that the new system will be easily accessible and widely publicized so that it reaches everyone who is currently at risk of disease. shortfall in their state pension.’

A announcement issued by HMRC said: ‘The Government will introduce legislation to introduce a route for people to claim National Insurance credits for parents and carers for tax years in which they have not claimed child benefit, to ensure people do not miss out on their entitlement to a state pension.

‘The credit will add qualifying years of National Insurance, if eligible, which will support future entitlement to a state pension.’

HMRC said legislation will be proposed as soon as possible to allow individuals to claim this credit from 2026, and their eligibility will be closely based on the criteria for receiving child benefit.

‘Transitional arrangements will ensure that those affected since 2013 can still make a claim. “Going forward, applications will be available for six years after the relevant tax year,” the report said.

Webb, now a partner at LCP and This is Money’s pensions columnist, added: ‘It is welcome news that the Government is finally tackling the problem of parents missing out on vital credit towards their state pension.’

But he continued: ‘It is extraordinary that we have had 10 years of people’s state pension data being damaged by the impact of the high child benefit tax, and that the Government has now had to come up with a different system to solve the problems. caused by its own policy.’

Helen Morrissey, head of pensions analysis at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: ‘State pension prospects for many parents and carers have received a huge boost today as the Government announced details of how to close gaps in their National Insurance data caused by failure to claim child benefits. .

‘The introduction of the High Income Child Benefit in 2013 prompted many people to no longer apply for child benefit.

‘However, many did not realize that they were also missing out on important credits for their state pension.

‘Subsequent attempts to enable them to claim National Insurance Credit without receiving child benefit did help, but many parents and carers were still left with gaps in their data that would lead to a lower state pension.

‘From April 2026, they will be able to claim credit to fill these gaps with transitional arrangements that ensure those with gaps dating back to 2013 don’t miss out.

“It’s a welcome step forward in solving a saga that has added unnecessary complexity to people’s retirement planning.”

Parents are in the dark about the link between child benefit and pension

Innocent errors in child benefit meant that many parents would lose tens of thousands of pounds in old age. Thousands faced worse pensions because they failed to complete a child benefit form within three months of birth.

The problem arose because the number of families claiming child benefit has fallen since a controversial overhaul in 2013.

This also left a hole in many women’s future state pensions due to the crucial but little-known link between the two payments.

If you didn’t file for child support because you weren’t entitled to the payments, you didn’t receive credits toward your state pension.

When parents realized too late that this would affect their state pension and applied, they were allowed to use their credits retroactively for three months, but lost their right to the rest forever.

Parents can apply for child support, but check a box to stop receiving payments and only receive state pension credits.

However, many families have assumed that they do not need to file a claim because they are not eligible to receive the money.

Child benefit will be reduced for those earning more than £50,000 a year, or abolished entirely for those earning more than £60,000 – something officially known as ‘high income child benefit’ or HICBC.

The rules came under fire from the start because they penalize families where one parent earns just over £50,000, but families where both parents earn slightly less still receive full child benefit.

The threshold has not changed since it was introduced, meaning that every year more families are no longer eligible for child benefit, and more and more new parents are at risk of not registering and missing out on thousands of pounds of state pension that they would otherwise have benefited from. would be eligible if they retired.

Parents who have missed out on credits can make up for them before retirement by working enough years and paying national insurance, or by qualifying for them in some other way, such as as a caregiver.

But this was not guaranteed, and by the time they reached retirement age, parents would not necessarily be wealthy in their own right, or still married to a partner whose high income excluded them from child benefits.

This is Money campaigned for mothers for five years

Until announcing a reversal last spring, the government eschewed a This is Money campaign on behalf of families.

Steve Webb launched a high-profile petition in 2018 demanding that mothers’ pension credits be made fully retroactive.

But the government rejected his request, arguing that it is too difficult to verify child benefit claims older than three months.

Meanwhile, the government’s tax gurus, the Office of Tax Simplification, said in a report that it was “unreasonable” for parents to lose their state pension because of child benefit errors that they cannot later correct.

However, no action was taken.

Many people wrote about the issue on our pages, including former Pensions Minister Ros Altmann and former MP and Finance Committee chairman Nicky Morgan.

Emma Maslin was one of the mothers who first contacted us, and we told the story of how she lost four years of her state pension, which could have left her with tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket if she had lived another 20 years after retirement.

Maslin, a financial coach who writes a personal finance blog The money whisperer and is pictured below with Webb, joined forces with our campaign and wrote about her experiences here.