WW2 veteran takes 'Frozen Pensions' fight directly to Keir Starmer's doorstep

The 99-year-old has written to the Prime Minister urging him to meet with her as she brings her "fight for justice" over frozen pensions to the UK.

Anne will be travelling the 7,000 miles from her home in Calgary, Canada, in December - just days before her 100th birthday - in the hope of discussing the "discriminatory policy" with him.

In the letter she urges the PM to end the decades-long policy which means that the state pensions of retired Britons living overseas do not rise with inflation.

Their weekly payments were frozen on the day they left the country, meaning many are missing out on thousands of pounds a year compared with their domestic counterparts.

Some of these pensioners live in poverty while many others are struggling to get by.

"While I realise you face heavy challenges in your relatively new appointment, I hope you might agree with my feeling that I have no choice but to undertake the arduous journey back to the UK and make this request, considering the scale of the injustice resulting from this policy," she says.

"I emphasise that we cannot understand why so many of us are now living on a fraction of the state pension when we paid all our contributions on exactly the same terms as those who receive their state pension in full."

Ann points out that she receives a UK state pension of just £72.50 which is in stark contrast to the £169.50 she would be receiving had I stayed in the UK.

This is despite the fact she lived and worked in the UK until the age of 76 and paid all her contributions.

"So many of us had no warning of the brutality of the Frozen Pensions policy," she tells the Prime Minister.

"Most of us were not told our state pensions would be 'frozen' in this way when we moved abroad.

"My appeals to previous Ministers and Prime Ministers have been ignored, but I sincerely hope you will feel able to grant me this one request to hear my case."

She warns that many of the 453,000 other British state pensioners directly affected "suffer deeply".

She adds: "I understand that times are challenging. I understand that your schedule will be pressured.

"However, I hope you will agree that we are amongst the people that helped build and, in many cases, defend the country. We all paid our required dues to Britain."

Her rallying cry comes after campaigners launched a new petition calling on the government to end the injustice.

Labour promised to uprate pensions for British expats living overseas in its 2019 general election manifesto but didn't include the pledge this time around.

The policy has been left unchanged by successive governments for around 70 years.

In 1955, British state pensions became payable anywhere in the world - but were not inflation-linked.

Reciprocal arrangements with only certain countries to uprate pension payments have been made in the ensuing decades.

But there are still around 150 countries where there is no agreement, including many Commonwealth nations like Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand.

Campaigners argue the cost of changing the policy would be around £300 million over five years and just £50 million in the first year as it would start from the day any deal was signed, rather than being backdated.

Last week a Government spokesperson said: "We understand that people move abroad for many reasons, and we provide clear information on gov.uk about how this can impact their finances in retirement.

"The International Pension Centre is a source of advice for people who are already retired.

"The Government's policy on the uprating of the UK State Pension for recipients living overseas is a longstanding one of more than 70 years and we continue to uprate state pensions overseas where there is a legal requirement to do so."

If you would like to sign the petition visit the Change.org website or click