A homeless woman is often seen pulling three battered suitcases behind her. For sixteen years, everyone assumes she has lost her minduntil, today, it all unravels. Winifred, a sharp-witted eighty-year-old, has just recently celebrated her milestone birthday. In her younger days, Winifred worked as a machinist. When redundancy struck as she neared retirement, she didn’t give up. With characteristic English grit, she retrained as a legal assistant and made the bold move to London, hoping for a fresh start in the capital. But, at over sixty, Winifred found that the city wasnt welcoming to someone of her age. She managed to pick up temporary jobs but could not make enough to afford Londons soaring rents.
Gradually, Winifred was left with nowhere to live but shelters, occasionally sleeping rough with only a sleeping bag for warmth. Her state pension did come through, but every month the amount fluctuated wildlyfrom £250 to almost £750with neither rhyme nor reason. Baffled by this, Winifred tried to get answers, but her complaints as a homeless woman went ignored. Knowing that once she withdrew and spent each pension payment the proof would vanish, she cleverly never cashed the cheques. Instead, she sent them straight back to the Department for Work and Pensions, demanding clarification, month after month.
Winifred has four grown-up children. During all this time, her daughter, who lives in Manchester, has been knocking on doors across London trying to find her mother. Winifred never told her children that she was homeless; she would only ring them now and then to say everything was fine. Once her daughter discovered the truth, she immediately pleaded with Winifred to come back to Manchester and live with her, but Winifred refused. She insisted she would not leave London until she had sorted out her pension.
Meticulously, Winifred organised all her correspondence with officials, and as the years passed, it filled three suitcases. She wheeled them everywhere; people assumed she was insane and urged her to throw away her load of old rubbish. Everyone said Id gone mad and should just get rid of the suitcases, recalls Winifred. She continued on, surviving in shelters for sixteen years, undeterred.
One day, in the shelter, Winifred confided in a staff member named Julie. Julie asked if she might look at Winifreds documents and was startled by their orderliness: every form and letter was filed by date. All the papers were carefully sorted. She really had been telling the truththe government owed her a fortune, said Julie.
With Julies help, Winifred found a solicitor who finally took her case. Suddenly, the Department for Work and Pensions began to move. Just yesterday, on the twenty-third of August, Winifreds bank account received a deposit£77,000. Her solicitor believes the amount due is actually higher. Even now, Winifred scarcely believes she’s won. She has rented a small flat and left the shelter behind. For sixteen years, everyone assumed Winifred was mad, not a single solicitor would advocate on her behalf, and even her daughter lost hope. If not for her chance meeting with Julie, Winifred might have remained in the shelter for life.
