Tories split over Waspi women compensation

Would the Conservatives have done what Labour wouldn’t and compensate the Waspi women?

No, according to leader Kemi Badenoch. “For years, the prime minister and his cabinet played politics with the Waspi women – the Women Against State Pension Inequality Campaign,” she told the House of Commons. “The deputy prime minister said the Conservatives were stealing their pensions. She promised to compensate them in full – another broken promise. Now, they admit that we were right all along.”

But wait! Here’s shadow Wales secretary Mims Davies implying that, if only they hadn’t been unceremoniously booted out of office in July, they might have compensated them after all.

“I think the fundamental thing here is the betrayal of the Waspi women,” Davies tells the BBC’s Walescast. “They need to own this decision – it’s the betrayal of the Waspi women by Labour. It’s a choice and it’s absolutely right that they own those choices.”

Pressed on whether the Tories would have compensated the women, Davies said: “We were looking at the report. There was no decision made at that point… if you wanted to find a way, which they have for some of their paymasters and their favourites, they could have done it.”

Which seems to entirely contradict her own leader’s stated position. Still, given she’s the closest thing the Tories have to a Welsh MP – she went to Swansea University, although is from Croydon and represents a seat in Sussex – she probably considers herself unsackable.