About SWAPP

SWAPP is a campaigning network that was set up in May 2002 to fight for justice in women's pensions.  SWAPP is backed by MPs of all political parties, and is headed up by Mrs Margaret Watts from Weymouth, who has first-hand experience of the injustices of the pensions system. 

SWAPP was launched at the House of Commons by Rt Hon Charles Kennedy MP, Leader of the Liberal Democrats, well-known agony aunt Claire Rayner, and Steve Webb MP, Lib Dem Work and Pensions Spokesman. 

Steve Webb MP and Claire Rayner at the SWAPP launch

SWAPP seeks to highlight the ways in which women past, present and future have had, and are continuing to receive, a raw deal from the pensions system.   We encourage our members to write to their MPs about the issues that concern them. 

The Married Woman's Stamp

The current focus of the campaign is on the married women's reduced rate National Insurance contribution.   Since the mid 1970s, more than 4.5 million women have paid over £8 billion in return for little or no state pension rights.

Over 1,000 women have written to SWAPP to report that they were never made aware of the implications of their option to pay the "married woman's stamp". This choice meant that they would not receive a pension in their own right at 60, but would get up to 60% on top of their husband's pension when he reached 65.  It also meant that they forfeited the right to other benefits such as jobseeker's allowance, incapacity benefit etc.

For more detail on the married woman's stamp issue, click here.

Married Woman's Reduced Stamp

We are currently campaigning on the married woman's stamp.

• Many women in their 40s and 50s have paid National Insurance at the reduced rate for married women, and are only discovering as they near retirement that although they will get a 60% pension on top of their husband's pension when he reaches 65, they will receive no pension in their own right.
   

• The Government maintains that all women made a "free and informed choice" to pay the reduced stamp, and signed a form stating this.  We do not dispute the fact that many people did consciously decide to pay a lower rate of National Insurance in full knowledge of the implications.  However, SWAPP has received more than 1,000 letters from women reporting that they were not warned of the consequences at the time, or at any point since, even though they were able in theory to opt out of the reduced stamp at any point.

 What are we asking the Government to do?

• We are calling on the Government to write to all women who have ever paid the married woman’s stamp to warn them that their pension rights may be in jeopardy. .

• The Government should consider allowing women to "buy  back" some of their full National Insurance Contribution years, or giving women a pension based on the amount of money that they paid into the system.  

• We are asking the Government to hold an independent inquiry into the situation. 

What can you do?

• Click here for some ideas!