There is a group of pensioners living in my constituency who were affected when the commercial arm of the UK Atomic Energy Authority was privatised in 1996 and a company called AEA Technology was created. At the time, they were given assurances that their pensions would be protected, but when the company later went bankrupt, their pensions lost 35% of their value. The AEAT Pension Campaign Group was formed of pensioners affected and I was the founder and Chair of the AEA Technologies All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG), which campaigns on this issue in Parliament.
I created and Chaired the first Parliamentary group to campaign on behalf of these local pensioners, have introduced a 10 Minute Rule Bill and have met with Ministers and DWP to raise their case.
In 2022, I secured the first ever independent investigation of their case after a decade of trying, from the National Audit Office - who agreed to my request to look at the AEAT Pension case and publish a report setting out their findings. This followed me writing to and meeting with the Head of the NAO to present him with evidence from the Campaign and argue that this case should be looked at by them.
In 2023, I then got Parliament’s powerful Public Accounts Committee to hold an inquiry and produce its own report making recommendations to the Government following the NAO Report - which I met with the then Pensions Minister, Laura Trott, to push for.
I also met with the new Pensions Minister, Paul Maynard, to make the case again.
You can see more about my campaign by clicking on the links below.
