HC Deb 11 April 1973 vol 854 cc304-5W
Mr. Wilkinson

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is his estimate of the cost of a retrospective award of pension to widows of 1914–18 war pensioners whose death before 1939 was directly attributable to war service.

Mr. Dean

The great majority of widows whose husbands died as a result of service in the 1914 war have received war widow's pension since the husband's death, irrespective of the date when this occurred. There is no register of those few widows who were not eligible for pension, and accordingly it is impossible to estimate the cost of awarding them pensions retrospectively from the dates when their husbands died.