British citizens retired overseas on Wednesday lost their high court battle for the right to have their state retirement pensions increased in line with inflation.
A judge rejected accusations that the government was unlawfully discriminating against tens of thousands of expatriates and said the issue was for Parliament.
Justice Stanley Burnton, sitting in London, ruled the government was entitled lawfully to decide to restrict the payments. He said: ”In my judgment, the remedy of the expatriate UK pensioners who do not receive uprated pensions is political, not judicial.”
The test case was brought by Annette Carson, 61, who challenged a refusal by the Department for Work and Pensions to index her pension and make annual increases because she lives in South Africa.
Her legal action was supported by the South African Association of British Pensioners and closely watched by Australian and Canadian officials and pensioners.
Government figures show that, of 900 000 United Kingdom pensioners living abroad, about 420 000 living in certain countries receive inflation indexed increases while 480,000 others — including those living in South Africa, Australia, Canada and New Zealand — are the victims of frozen pensions.
Lawyers for Carson had argued that the social security benefits’ uprating regulations were being operated in a way that amounted to unlawful discrimination, in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights.
A win could have led to the government to facing an additional pensions bill of £390-million a year.
The Director General of Age Concern, Gordon Lishman, said the ruling was disappointing. ”People have to pay National Insurance contributions throughout their working life to be entitled to the full basic state pension. And therefore it is scandalous that they should not benefit from the annual inflationary increase that pensioners living in Britain receive.
”Pensioners living abroad no longer use the services that they have paid into, such as the NHS, and the least the government can do is provide them with a basic state pension that older people living in Britain receive.”
Lishman said the rule stopped many older people from moving abroad to join family and friends.