WASPI woman forced to 'keep working' after message from DWP she 'thought was a joke'

A WASPI woman says she was forced to KEEP WORKING after hip and spinal disc replacements. Angela Merrick, who has osteoarthritis, has had to keep returning to work after surgery. She is angered at losing the £300 Winter Fuel Allowance from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) - before even receiving it.

Ms Merrick, 66, told i she is one of an estimated 3.8 million WASPI affected by major changes to the state pension age. The mum-of-four and grandmother-of seven worked in railway ticket offices for 28 years and said she feels lucky that her employer provided full sick pay during surgeries.

She told the i paper this week: "I couldn’t afford not to work.” Like 3.8 million women affected by the state pension age changes, she learned about the extension when she was 58, thinking she had only two years left to retire.

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She said: "At first, I thought it was a joke, but then I realised I faced working another eight years.” She says she was 58 and believing she only had two years left until retirement when she discovered from a colleague that the state pension age had changed and she now had to work until 66.

“I was thinking ‘thank goodness I can retire at 60’ as everything was taking its toll on me – my physical health and my mental health – and then my work friend told me we had to work until 66,” she recalled. And she expressed frustration over the lost years, telling the i that not being able to retire at 60 “stole part of my life.”

She continued: “I missed part of my grandchildren’s lives and wasn’t able to help as much as I would have liked as I was working shifts and weekends.” She added: “Ministers repeatedly said they wanted to restore trust in politics during the election. Ignoring the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s instructions to provide compensation to Waspi women would certainly fall far short of this.”