Campaigning effectively and getting results

A lot of political campaigning seems to be about delivering leaflets, running petitions, speaking at meetings, issuing press releases etc., but at the end of it you sometimes need to remember that this is not the only way to get things done. My experience of running a successful campaign to get pensions justice for thousands of women (see today's Daily Mail) shows that a different approach can often reap rewards.

The background to this story is that I was contacted some months ago by the Times newspaper about the cases of women who were not getting the full amount of state pension to which they were entitled. This was because the computer records of their time spent at home with children were incomplete. Under the state pension system you can get a measure of protection (known quaintly as 'Home Responsibilities Protection') for your pension rights if you are at home with a child under 16. But because of problems getting data from one computer to another, a significant number of women were missing out on some serious money.

I publicised the issue in the press and on the radio and heard from over a thousand women around the country who thought they might be affected. Along with my team in the office I went through each of these cases individually to find the strongest dozen or so 'case studies' to put to the Government. To give them their credit, the DWP looked at the cases, agreed that there were a dozen good cases that we had sent in (including one woman who has now received over £10,000 in back pension plus interest!) and we had several meetings with ministers and officials to work out what to do next.

DWP and HMRC officials have now come up a 'cunning plan' to trawl through millions of NIC records to try to 'pair up' retired women with the children for whom they should have got HRP in the past but never did. It may take months of work, but could ultimately result in a pensions boost running to tens of millions of pounds for these women.

It's interesting that working mostly quietly, behind the scenes and in a calm and apolitical way has got results, when shouting across the floor of the House of Commons probably would not have done so.