A GROUP to support women who say they have been shortchanged because of changes to the state pension has been established in parliament by a Bolton MP.

Bolton West MP Chris Green has joined forces with his colleagues to set up a new parliamentary group on the state pension age, in a bid to support the Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) campaign.

Campaigners say changes to the state pension age have unfairly hit women born in the 1950s.

They say the changes have caused disparities between women aged just a few years younger and older than each other.

While the campaign believes in pension equality, it wants 'fair transitional' arrangements for women born after April 6, 1951 who have seen their pension age rise rapidly to fall in line with men and had retirement plans thrown into disarray.

According to figures from the House of Commons Library, around 4,200 women are directly affected by the 2011 Pension Act in the Bolton West constituency.

In addition, 578 local people signed an e-petition calling for transitional arrangements to be introduced to counter the problem — the third highest number of signatures out of all 650 constituencies in the country.

Mr Green faced criticism earlier this year from campaigner Marina Maley, who said she had received three separate letters from Bolton West MP Chris Green stating that he would be supporting the campaign, only to hear he voted against a Labour motion to introduce transitional arrangements.

The MP maintained he backs the campaign but said he believed the Labour motion would not have garnered the correct results.

Mr Green said: "When I was first elected as Member of Parliament for Bolton West, I pledged to support every woman affected by these changes in any way I can.

"I have had numerous meetings with ‘WASPI women’ living in my constituency and have raised this issue with Ministers.

"I am therefore proud to be a founding member of this new Parliamentary campaign group.

"Many of these affected women have worked hard for decades without taking a penny out of the system and I’m hopeful that we will reach an outcome that they deserve."