Bereavement Support Payment
Money Box
BBC
4.2 • 825 Ratings
🗓️ 15 February 2020
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Should the unwed lose out on a benefit paid to married people? Bereavement Support Payment is available to the widows, widowers or surviving civil partners of people who died on or after 6 April 2017. There's additional money if they have children. A recent High Court judgement held that the Pensions Act, by excluding bereaved unmarried partners from claiming Bereavement Support Payment, contravened the human rights of any children they might have. This week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson told parliament that he would look into what he described as an "injustice". Guest: Alison Penny, director of the Childhood Bereavement Network.
Richard is 20 and earns £18,000 a year. He applied online for a credit card. When this was approved he was shocked to find he had an £8,000 credit limit. Guest: Peter Tutton, head of policy, StepChange debt charity.
If you missed the January self-assessment tax deadline, picked up a £100 penalty and still haven't filed, there's another deadline. It's March 1st and if you have tax to pay the penalties for missing it could cost you a great deal more.
How can you track down old pensions from past jobs? When you find them, will you be able to you lump them together? Guest: Claire Trott, head of pension strategy for Technical Connections.
Presenter: Paul Lewis Reporter: Dan Whitworth Producer: Charmaine Cozier Editor: Emma Rippon
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | In Northern Ireland, from the late 70s to the early 90s, the IRA killed over 40 alleged informers. |
| 0:08.0 | But the man who often found, tortured and sometimes killed these people on behalf of the IRA |
| 0:12.0 | was himself an informer, a secret British army agent with the codename Stakeknife. |
| 0:18.0 | Who gets to play God? And why me? Why my family? |
| 0:21.3 | When lies are still being told to this day, who do you believe? |
| 0:25.1 | I wouldn't even know where to start, and I'm with the IRA. |
| 0:28.5 | Steakknife. |
| 0:29.7 | Listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:33.5 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:43.8 | Hello, the 20-year-old on low pay who got a credit card with £8,000 to spend. |
| 0:47.1 | How many pensions have you paid into and where's the money? |
| 0:50.9 | Could you face a tax penalty on March the 1st? But we start with the Prime Minister who stepped in this week to say he wants to |
| 0:55.5 | remedy and injustice his word in the benefits paid for children when a parent dies. |
| 1:01.4 | Bereavement support payment is given to anyone under pension age when their spouse or civil |
| 1:05.8 | partner dies. For those with children it totals £9,600 over 18 months. |
| 1:12.0 | But the money's only paid if the parents were married or in a civil partnership. |
| 1:16.2 | That leaves out couples who were not married or civil partnered. |
| 1:19.8 | A week ago, the High Court said that rule breached the human rights of their children. |
| 1:24.5 | On Wednesday, Liberal Democrat acting leader Ed Davy asked the Prime Minister |
| 1:28.7 | this question in Parliament. |
| 1:30.2 | When Kevin Simpson's partner of over 12 years died and his two children lost their mother, |
| 1:37.4 | the family received no bereavement support payments at all. Because the parents were |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.