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BBC West Investigations
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BBCTime has now not dimmed Ernest Williams’ sense of injustice.
Despite being 90 years of age, the previous Royal Navy veteran says he nonetheless has a “burning fire” inside of him.
He believes he was once “robbed” of the army pension he deserved and has been preventing to have it corrected because the 1980s.
“I’m coming up to 91 and I haven’t got long to go,” Mr Williams mentioned. “I’m doing it for my wife.”
It wasn’t till Mr Williams had an opportunity dialog along with his brother-in-law Ronald Oswell, that he says he realised what had came about.
The two males had nearly similar provider data and each carried out for redundancy when the United Kingdom militia regarded to cut back numbers in 1969.
But whilst Mr Williams, who lives in King’s Stanley, Gloucestershire, was once given a discharge date in 1970, his brother-in-law was once allotted one in 1972.
“He said ‘What do you think of the pension, Ernie?’,” Mr Williams advised BBC West Investigations.
“I said, ‘Well £440 a year is not very good, is it?’
“And he mentioned ‘No it is £880 a 12 months’.”
Family photoIt transpired that during the intervening two years, military pension rules had changed and had Mr Williams been given the later discharge date he would have got a much better pension.
The Ministry of Defence said it cannot comment on individual cases, but during his time campaigning Mr Williams has been told that his pension reflected his “complete and right kind entitlement”.
Mr Williams enlisted in the navy aged 18 in 1952, eventually becoming a Chief Petty Officer. He served many years overseas, including on aircraft carriers in the far east.
However, as the UK armed forces looked to reduce numbers, he was offered redundancy under a navy programme known as DCI 1187/68.
The navy agreed to add time to his service record so that he received a military pension in addition to the state pension.
But crucially, Mr Williams says he was not given a say in when he left the armed forces, and rather was told he would leave the navy on 28 November 1970.
Others who applied at the same time were given a discharge date in 1972.
“You’re advised if you end up going. [Your discharge date] was once now not disclosed till a while later. There was once not anything I may do about it,” Mr Williams mentioned.
Mr Williams and his wife Wendy believe about 400 men were discharged in the same ‘first wave’ as him, with about 2,600 going in the ‘second wave’ in 1972, receiving a substantially improved pension.
Mrs Williams said: “What did this 400 do this was once so flawed they needed to be discriminated in opposition to financially?”
She added that the extra money would have made a “huge distinction” to their lives.
The couple launched a series of appeals to various official bodies once they realised what had happened.
In May 1984, Mr Williams was told by the MOD that both his and his brother-in-law’s pension “are right kind” and the disparity was due to “a pay upward thrust for CPO’s [Chief Petty Officers] within the intervening two years which is mirrored within the fundamental pension awarded”.
He continued to fight his case throughout the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s.
In 1998, the Armed Forces Personnel Administration Agency told Mr Williams that in the period between the two phases, “adjustments have been made [to the military pension] however those adjustments weren’t retrospective” and that his pension reflected his “complete and right kind entitlement”.
Over the years Mr Williams has been supported by some of Stroud’s MPs.
In 2019, Labour MP David Drew wrote to Penny Mordaunt, the Defence Secretary at the time, to highlight Mr Williams’ case, believing he was the victim of “an injustice” and had been “unfairly handled”.
Mr Drew argued that comments made by senior politicians in the late 1960s about intended improvements to military pay meant that possible differences in pensions should have been foreseen.
He describes Mr Williams’ case as “stunning” and that “each the method and the documentation surrounding the volunteer redundancies have been ethically wrong”.
But ultimately, Mr Williams received the same answer from everybody he asked to look at his case – that his pension was correct based on the rules at the time.
Mr Williams still maintains that before he left, he never had the effect of different discharge dates explained to him – and that he would never have accepted redundancy on the earlier date had he known an extra two years would have effectively doubled his pension.
Armed Forces Pension GroupMr Williams’ case has similarities to a fight waged by other military veterans over their pensions.
Jim Monaghan was involved with the Equality for Veterans Association (EfVA) which also campaigned against pension decisions in the 1970s.
Military rules before April 1975 meant that in most circumstances, servicemen had to serve 22 years to be eligible for an armed forces pension in addition to the state pension.
Mr Monaghan left the RAF at the end of 1974, having accrued 14 years’ service, including in Singapore and the middle east.
Had he left a few months later, he would have received a military pension. The rule change in 1975, like rules on pensions generally, were not retrospective.
The issue was debated in parliament in 2015, with then-Defence Minister Anna Soubry saying making changes to pension policy retrospective would break an “very important concept” and “would result in common, long-term and unmanageable penalties for each this govt and long term governments”.
Mr Monaghan believes communication from the MOD was not good enough.
“Everyone was once saved in the dead of night,” he mentioned.
“They knew not anything about [pensions] after they have been younger.
“We never had a brief on pensions. We were never given any insight and probably we didn’t have any interest because I was a young man.”
The Equalities for Veterans Association was once disbanded a couple of years in the past – as a result of a loss of good fortune and the dwindling collection of surviving veterans from that duration.
Family photoMr Williams says he feels “very bitter” about his enjoy however hopes that through talking out publicly for the primary time, he can convey extra consideration to his case.
He additionally hopes every other servicemen nonetheless alive and suffering from the similar factor will come ahead.
He added he intends to proceed his marketing campaign through contacting the present Stroud MP, Labour’s Simon Opher, within the hope he’ll soak up the case.
Mr Williams mentioned: “I’m just a stubborn old sod and I’m not going to give in. I would appreciate it if anybody said to me ‘you were right and we were wrong’.”
