A Ryedale councillor has hailed as a victory the Government's decision to protect pensioners from failures over the State Earnings-Related pension Scheme.

Coun Keith Orrell said that after years of campaigning, pensioners in Ryedale were finally to receive the money they had expected all along.

MPs announced earlier this year that the failure to publicise rule changes in SERPS in 1986, meaning widows and widowers would only inherit half of their partner's SERPS, had been a major administrative blunder.

SERPS was set up in 1978 and the Conservative administration under Margaret Thatcher decided in 1986 to change the rules but did not adequately publicise the matter.

The Government announced last week that pensioners misinformed about the SERPS rule change would receive the full amount to which they were entitled.

"Pensioners I know who were personally affected by this mistake by the Government at the time will now get the money they were entitled to all along," he said.

"Despite the anger and anxiety pensioners have reported to me, I know this will bring relief to many people.

"Justice has finally been done; along with my colleague Steve Webb MP, the Liberal Democrat spokesman on Social Security, I have been campaigning to persuade the Government to protect pensioners from the failure of the last administration.

"The original scheme to make the pensioners themselves prove they had been misinformed was entirely unworkable.

"My only regret is that it has taken so long to persuade the Government to take this course of action. I wish they had listened to us earlier."