STEPHEN LEWIS finds out what women - and men - can do to forestall the prospect of existing on meagre pensions

CHRISTINE Cann is expecting a nice little bonus this Christmas. Sometime in December she will be getting her first state pension cheque. It will be paid annually, she says; a grand total of just over £20 - or 45p a week.

"Although I think it is going up to 48p," she says. "That will be nice for Christmas."

It's good she can joke about it - otherwise she might be reduced to tears.

Christine, 60, from Wigginton, who retired from her full-time job as a special education nursery nurse with City of York Council at Easter, is one of up to 1.5 million women around the country facing the misery of a pitifully-small state pension because they chose to pay the 'married woman's stamp' instead of full national insurance contributions - often following Government advice.

In Christine's case, it's particularly galling because she had already paid nine years of full contributions before taking five years off work to have children. If she had paid one more year, she would have been automatically entitled to a basic state pension in her own right.

Instead, when she went back to work full-time in 1972, it was suggested she pay the married woman's stamp. "In those days it was what you were advised to do."

She paid it for 30 years - not realising it covered her only in case she got sick, and didn't give her any pension entitlement.

"Some time along the line, I would have been asked if I wanted to pay the full stamp," she acknowledges. "But I have been ignorant and haven't done it. I just presumed I would get some kind of pension, because I had paid some stamps. I didn't expect a full pension, but something."

When her pension forecast came, at first she didn't believe it. She thought the word 'nil' must refer to her 'graduated' pension - a 'top up' pension scheme that operated between 1961 and 1975.

It didn't - and by the time Christine realised that, it was too late even for her to 'buy back' a year of National Insurance contributions and qualify for a state pension, because she had passed 60.

Instead, she has to wait two years until her husband Ray, now 63, retires, before she can claim a 60 per cent state pension through his contributions.

It was the Liberal Democrats who drew attention to the plight of women in Christine's position - women who, some after apparently receiving advice from the then Department of Health and Social Security, chose not to pay their full contributions.

The 'married women's stamp' was discontinued in 1977 - but women who had been paying it were allowed to continue to do so.

Mary Gray says it was presented to her almost as a privilege.

Mary, 60, was first faced with the choice of what contributions to pay when she started work 40 years ago.

She went along to the then equivalent of the benefits office. "They said if you pay the full stamp you get maternity allowance and money towards a pram," she says.

"I said 'I'm not getting married, I'll pay the smaller stamp'."

In 1984, when she switched jobs, she was asked whether she wanted to continue paying the married woman's stamp. "They said I would need a certificate of exemption to allow me to," she says. "It made me feel almost as though it was a privilege."

According to Steve Webb, the Lib Dems' social security spokesman, that kind of advice amounted to 'mis-selling'.

The Lib Dems have called for women in Christine and Mary's position to be allowed to 'buy back' their missing years of contributions at a discounted rate, a campaign backed by agony aunt Claire Raynor.

Christine and Mary accept that compared with some women, they are lucky. Christine at least has her occupational pension. Mary, meanwhile, already gets a reduced state pension because of her husband Gerry's contributions. He is 69 and has passed retirement age.

Other women are not so fortunate - especially those without occupational pensions of their own and those whose husbands are younger than they are, meaning it could be years before they can claim a reduced state pension. It is difficult to estimate just how many women in North Yorkshire are in that position. But Richard Porter of York Citizens' Advice Bureau says in the past two years, his office has had about 150 inquiries from women about retirement pensions.

"Nearly 60 per cent were women with pension forecasts," he says. "This might lead to the conclusion that they were questioning the amounts that had been notified to them."

Christine's advice to women who are still working and unsure what their pension entitlement is simple - find out as soon as possible.

Des Hamilton, technical director of the pensions advisory service OPAS, agrees.

He says it may be that some women will be better off by opting for a pension paid for out of their husband's rather than their own national insurance contributions. But others will not. It will depend on each woman's individual circumstances. So it is very important to know what your state pension entitlement is, so you can decide whether to start supplementing it, he says.

"You should go to the Department of Work and Pensions and get a forecast," he says. "The earlier you do that, the better. It is not something we would recommend simply to people coming up to retirement. It is something you should be doing in middle age."

Mary Gray's husband, independent financial adviser Gerry Gray, of York firm Grosvenor Financial Consultants - the couple married in 1987 - stresses that everybody, not just women, should think seriously about their pension as early as possible.

With an increasingly ageing population, the state is no longer going to be able to provide for everybody in the way we might like, he says. Individuals are increasingly going to have to take responsibility themselves for ensuring they will have enough for a comfortable retirement.

That might mean supplementing your state and company pension with other forms of investment - perhaps a stakeholder pension, or cash ISAs.

The first thing, he says, is to get a pensions forecast not only from the Department for Work and Pensions but also your own company pension scheme - then assess whether those will give you enough.

"You should know roughly what kind of income you require to live comfortably in retirement, and where that income is coming from," he says.

"It will be part state pension, part company pension, and part savings and investments. If there is a shortfall, you need to be thinking about how you are going to make up that shortfall."

And the time to do that, whether you're a man or a woman, is now.

For a state pension forecast, call the Retirement Pension and Forecasting Advice Unit on 0191 218 7585. For advice on pension options, try the OPAS (pensions advisory service) helpline on 0845 6012923 or consult a financial adviser. If you are worried about your pension, the Citizens' Advice Bureau may be able to help - call the York and District office on 01904 623648.

Updated: 10:45 Thursday, May 23, 2002