Minister for Pensions and Financial Inclusion visits Citizens Advice Lewisham (CAL)

The Minister for Pensions and Financial Inclusion, Guy Opperman visited Citizens Advice Lewisham (CAL) on Monday 21st February to meet with staff and volunteers, including Chief Executive Officer, Fiona Derbyshire. 

From left to right: Guy Opperman (Minister for Pensions and Financial Inclusion), Simon Boulton (Advice Services Manager/Deputy CEO Citizens Advice Lewisham), Fiona Derbyshire (CEO Citizens Advice Lewisham) and Morgan Wild (Head of Policy Citizens Advice)

Accompanied by Morgan Wild, Head of Policy at Citizens Advice, and Matt Byrne, Senior Campaigns and Public Affairs Officer at Citizens Advice, the Minister’s visit was to discuss improvements around the communication of Pension Credits following concerns around the low take-up of the benefit. 

Introduced in 2003, Pension Credits provides financial support with living costs for those over State Pension age and on a low income. With the ongoing cost of living crisis and many struggling to cover their essential bills, CAL which supported over twenty thousand Lewisham residents in the last year was delighted to have the opportunity to discuss how to best resolve this issue to ensure that the most impacted were getting the information, advice and financial support they need.

Speaking on the low take up around Pension credits, Morgan Wild, Head of Policy at Citizens Advice said

It was fascinating to join the Pensions Minister’s visit to Lewisham Citizens Advice to discuss what more could be done to boost applications for Pension Credit.

Across our service, we’re seeing unprecedented levels of demand, as more and more people turn to us to help them navigate the cost of living crisis. However, applications for Pensions Credit have remained stubbornly low for years, meaning hundreds of thousands of people are missing out on vital support. 

Applying for Pension Credit can be really difficult for applicants –  the process is long and confusing and many people don’t feel comfortable making an application. We think there’s a really important role for civil society in helping with this challenge.” 

Also present at the meeting was Fiona Derbyshire, Chief Executive of Citizens Advice Lewisham, who said

CAL was able to host the Minister for Pensions, Guy Opperman today who wanted to talk about Pension Credit take-up in CAL clients. It was a lively conversation where we said that take-up was limited, likely due to digital challenges in accessing and completing the application for older clients. We proposed help to claim type service to support older clients in working through the application, ideally face to face, and the Minister challenged us to host an older peoples event to explore barriers to applying”.

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