Kate Hollern, Labour MP for Blackburn, writes her fortnightly column for the Lancashire Telegraph, this week focused on the WASPI women.

There are approximately 4,900 'WASPI women' in my constituency of Blackburn.

The campaign group Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) has spent years highlighting the issue and fighting for justice. They are seeking fair, fast and proportionate compensation for those affected by the failure of the Department for Work and Pensions to give adequate notice that the state pension age was changing.

In 1995, the then government legislated to increase the women’s state pension age from 60 to 65. Yet in the years following, these changes were not properly communicated.

The state pension age was raised again to 66 by the Pensions Act 2011. As a result, women born in the 1950s were victims of what the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has since deemed to be maladministration.

Some women were given only 12 months’ notice of the increase to their retirement age. By that point, many had already taken life-changing decisions concerning their retirement. As a result, tens of thousands were plunged into poverty.

WASPI women are currently some of the worst affected by the current cost-of-living crisis, with one third experiencing debt, and struggling to pay essential bills.

Women born in the 1950s have suffered – and continue to suffer – financial and emotional hardship through no fault of their own. It is not fair that women had the goalposts changed without their knowledge.

Of the 3.8 million women denied their state pension, 260,000 have died without having received a penny. It is now estimated that a WASPI woman dies every 13 minutes.

The Ombudsman is expected to release his final report into the impacts on those affected and how compensation – if any – should be paid, this spring.

It will be a combined assessment of the impacts on those affected and a recommendation to the government, outlining what financial remedies should be paid.

Parliamentarians will likely have a major role to play in how this is delivered.

As national budgets continue to be stretched, it will be necessary to find a fair and just solution that works for both affected women and the taxpayer.

I am keenly aware of this given Labour’s traditionally strong record on equality legislation.

As we await the report, I will continue to follow this issue closely, and raise my affected constituents’ concerns in Westminster.