#Winter Fuel Payment

[stillunusual]

Meanwhile in Starmer's Britain....

[insidecroydon]

Labour MPs' 'tears' won't keep the elderly warm this winter

Cold-hearted: the House of Commons chamber on Tuesday, where most Labour MPs toed their party line Why were Labour MPs threatened with losing the party whip, and what does it mean? ANDREW FISHER on how Croydon’s MPs voted over the removal of pensioners’ Winter Fuel Payment Voted to cut Winter Fuel Payment: Natasha Irons, Labour MP for Croydon East The decision to cut the Winter Fuel Payment for…

[icewindandboringhorror]

Bad news, got back from the vet and my beautiful baby son is going to have to be put down soon, probably tomorrow or the next day, so send him best of wishes for his next few days~ Luckily, he's actually not in a lot of pain (for now, hopefully he won't be) and is acting pretty normal, so I'm hoping he won't suffer at all and everything will be peaceful for him.

[eaglesnick]

“Autocratic governments are masters of self-contradiction. They say one thing, do another" — Alastair Reynolds

The hypocrisy of Rachel Reeves is astounding. Commenting on the Tory 2019 manifesto pledge to keep the pensioner triple lock and winter fuel payment:

"They should not be breaking those commitments", she said. "One thing I would be doing if I was chancellor today would be to have a proper windfall tax on the huge profits that the big energy giants are making and use that money to help people with their bills."  (Sky News: 29/09/23)

Rather than help them with their bills Reeves, now she is Chancellor, has done the exact opposite. So much for Starmer's pledge to rebuild trust in British politics.

Personally, I am not against restricting pensioner winter fuel payments to those on state benefit. There can be no justification for giving the 25% of pensioners who have assets worth more than a million pounds taxpayer subsidies. What I object to are the lies and deceit that are beginning to become the hallmark of Starmer and his front bench.

[branmer]

im just like i cant take much more of this tbh, i really feel like ive been snapping mentally recently. like we had 14 years of this shit and now we're just gonna have 5 more years because labour have fully bought the bullshit of austerity. i wanna cry. i feel feral

[wingerworthwritersassociation]

The Wool Coat of the Wolf.

Axing Universal Benefits: Is it Socialist? At work a friend asked me for an explanation of the universal winter fuel payment the current Government is abolishing. He asked if it was socialist/Marxist policy. I am known as an anti-conservative at work. The presumption is that I vote Labour. I hold up my hand, guilty. Yes, I have voted Labour in the past. But I have never voted for the Labour…

[ivovynckier]

What will it take for Labour MPs to face the decisions of their government?

[chriswhodrawsstuff]

Broken Britain

“When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. The case-book of Sherlock Holmes. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I’m trying to understand the situation with the British Labour party right now. Well, that’s not quite true; What I’m trying to understand is ‘Is there still a British Labour party left or is it just a watered down version of…

[ghostsinthecellar]

did I stay up past the point of tired so I would maybe sleep through the furnace people coming tomorrow so I wouldn't have to be the one dealing with them, knowing I'll hear them when they get here and be unable to sleep from the anxiety anyway? perhaps

[ayeforscotland]

Labour austerity in action.

I fucking said Labour would continue austerity, and guess what? Labour are continuing austerity.

Cutting winter fuel payment for pensioners will lead to deaths.

[satorimoney]

Exact code to spot £600 winter fuel payment in bank account as thousands still waiting for free cash

Exact code to spot £600 winter fuel payment in bank account as thousands still waiting for free cash

THOUSANDS of households waiting for winter fuel payments worth up to £600 should look out for a code in their bank account.The winter fuel payment is made to pensioners to help them with the cost of Read Full Text

[eaglesnick]

“To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies…involved the use of doublethink" -George Orwell

Here is an interesting fact.

“One in five households in Great Britain, headed by an over-65, has a total wealth of over a million pounds.” (fullfact.org: 14/07/21)

Two years later and that figure had increased even further.

“One in four British pensioners is now a millionaire."  (Telegraph 29/07/23)

In the same year, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Tory MP John Glen urged the scrapping of the winter fuel allowance to pensioners saying the money could be better-spent tackling child poverty.

I am in agreement with John Glen. Clearly it makes no economic or social sense to give the 25% of pensioners who are millionaires winter fuel payments. I know that many of these pensioners are only millionaires because of the value of their houses and they may be “cash poor” but there can be no  excuse for taxpayers to be subsidizing the already wealthy while child poverty, homelessness and the cost of living crisis are on the increase.

I am no fan of either Rachel Reeves or Sir Keir Starmer but on this occasion they are pursuing the right policy. The poorest pensioners, those on pension credit or other means tested benefits, will still receive the winter fuel allowance. Yes, those very close to the cut off income before eligibility for welfare benefits kicks in will suffer, but that problem is more about where the income cut off point should be rather than whether winter fuel payments should be a universal right for all pensioners regardless of wealth.

Historically, the right-wing press, and many Tory MP’s have called for the winter fuel payments to be scrapped.

The Daily Mail had this headline in 2010

“Anger as 665,000 expats claiming winter fuel payments." (MailOnline 16/02/10)

Hard to disagree.

“At the same time Emma boon of the Taxpayers Alliance said “We need to scrap universal benefits like the winter fuel payment, because it doesn't make sense to take people's money in tax, then give it back in benefits.” (MailOnline 20/10/10)

In 2012 a report from the Free Enterprise Group of Conservative MPs called for ministers to be "brave enough" to tell the wealthiest pensioners that their benefits will be cut.

Of course no Conservative government was ever going to cut the wither fuel payments for pensioners, no matter how well off they were, because it is a well known fact that the older a person is the more likely they are to vote Tory.

It is ironic, and a glaring example of double-standards, how Tory members of the Free Enterprise Group  - the group previously demanding the END to winter fuel payments for better-off pensioners – are now accusing Labour of heartless savagery.

“TATTON MP Esther McVey has slammed the Government’s ‘cruel’ decision to end winter fuel payments to nearly 10 million pensioners.” (Knutsford Guardian: 20/08/24)

Another former member of the Tory Free Enterprise Group, Priti Patel, has also been highly critical of Labour.

“The shocking plans that Keir Starmer’s Labour have for Britain are becoming clear for all to see. Starmer’s cruel and nasty plan to subsidise his trade union paymasters by stripping millions of pensioners of their winter fuel allowance is the clearest demonstration of Labour’s real agenda.”

No mention by either McVey or Patel that they once supported the very “cruel and nasty" policy that Labour is now pursuing.

Orwell’s doublethink is clearly alive and kicking in contemporary British politics.

[collapsedsquid]

Ministers are already under fire for their decision to end winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners, with Labour MPs warning that the decision could lead to a “cruel winter” for the most vulnerable people in the country. The prime minister is also under pressure to end the two-child benefit cap and extend the £1bn household support fund, which is due to end in September. McFadden suggested on Sunday, however, that Starmer and his chancellor, Rachel Reeves, were unlikely to reverse those decisions, and could make further unpopular ones in the months to come. “I understand there are people who are concerned about tough decisions, but it won’t be the last tough decision that we have to make in government,” he told Sky News. “It is about making tough decisions, because we saw what happened a few years ago when the public finances were lost control of. We don’t want a repeat of that, and these are the difficult decisions that a chancellor has to make now.” Separately, he told broadcasters: “Progress is being made, we are at the start of a journey of change in this parliament. Change has already begun, and more change will come in future years.”

Liz Truss's brief prime ministership really a martyrdom for fiscal conservatives, she lost her job embarrassingly so millions of brits can be poorer, the Randians will forever honor her sacrifice

[darkmaga-retard]

Peter Halligan

Sep 10, 2024

As you read this, note that millions of Brits are struggling with their utility bills. If the maths shown below is correct, those millions could be lifted out of energy poverty by charging a fair price for natural gas and abandoning the insane and environmentally hostile offshore turbine plantations.

Instead, the incompetent, insane and callous “net zero” fanatics prefer that the elderly and the poor suffer unnecessary poverty and hardship.

From here:

Winter fuel payments LIVE: Labour votes to cut allowance as MPs shout 'shame!' | Politics | News | Express.co.uk

“MPs have voted by 348 to 228 in favour of Rachel Reeves’ plan to snatch Winter Fuel Payments of millions of hard-pressed pensioners this Christmas. “

I had thought that the Labour government would baulk at rolling back its plans that are relied upon by many elderly people to keep them warm in winter:

(100) UK’s Labour Government about to be defeated by its own MPs over the withdrawal of a winter fuel allowance for the elderly to pay for offshore wind farms (substack.com)

The Labour Party had, in 2017, managed to defeat Conservatives who also planned to abolish the scheme – because the Labour Party published an analysis that it would kill 4,000 pensioners a year.

From the Express article:

“The move means millions of hard-pressed pensioners will lose out on up to £300 this winter, despite the expected higher energy bills.”