#Winter Fuel Payment

[stillunusual]

Meanwhile in Starmer's Britain....

[coreythegremlin]

with a £54 billion military budget and troops at 145 bases around the world, the last thing the UK should be cutting is winter fuel payments for the elderly. but cutting the military budget would harm investors, who'll barely notice if some old people suffer and die

[news-buzz]

6.6 million pensioners face harsh winter as fuel payments are axed, Ag | UK | News News Buzz

The “brutal” decision to axe OAP winter fuel payments has sparked widespread panic over rising energy costs, analysis reveals. Charity Age UK says 6.6 million pensioners will be forced to turn down or reduce the hours they use heating at home and a further 1.2 million slash the number of hot meals they eat to manage financially. The stark reality facing those who have had their £300 annual…

[insidecroydon]

Tories back Perry to have another go as £82,000 per year Mayor

Remember, remember, the fifth of November… There might be an election going on elsewhere today, but in Croydon the selection results are already in, and local Conservatives are standing full-square behind part-time Perry in his bid to remain as Mayor. As WALTER CRONXITE, our political editor reports, the way things are going, he might just win With 18 months to go until the next Town Hall…

[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.

[70-s-child]

[adj4mp]

Winter Fuel Payments, Pension Credits and a Political Mistake

The Winter Fule Payments has been a catastrophe in the PR handling of the problem.

Maybe it will save money

Yes most people won't notice the difference

Yes the media have made things worse

But the UK government missed a trick.

The Winter Fuel Payments which many people rely upon to get through the winter are becoming means-tested. It's being done in the cheapest way imaginable because it's been done to save money, it's being attached to Pension Credits. If you qualify for Pension Credits and recieve them as the vast majority of those who rely upon the winter fuel payments do then you'll get the same payment.

But there are hundreds of thousands of pensioners who would qualify for these credits who either haven't applied or when they last applied were above the threshold. And there are a whole bunch of people who're right on or above the cut-off to whom the payment would make a huge difference to their Christmas budget.

The Government dragging their heels and trying to excuse their way out of it maybe wasn't the direction they should have gone, this was in some ways a political opportunity.

For my money what should have been said:

"We understand the frustration and upset this decision has caused to many people. We've heard the pain this has caused. We encourage everyone who thinks that this payment will make a difference to apply for pension credits as soon as you can, if you get that you'll still receive the fuel payments. "We're also giving the Department of Work and Pensions officers and case workers discretionary power to accept people who are near the threshold temporarily, these people will be given pension credits until March as well as the Winter Fuel Payments giving us next spring and summer to review the policy and the impact as well as giving everyone more than a month or two to plan around this change to their finances"

I feel a statement like this would have turned the tides of public opinion and provided many with the motivation to actually apply for the pension credits they might not know they qualify for.

It would provide the government with data to assess the requirements for receiving pension credits and perhaps even encourage them to make it a progressive benefit that fades out rather than with a hard-line border

And the discretionary power doesn't need to be huge to still work, the upper-income limit for pension credits is around £11,400 per year and the Winter Fuel Payment is £300, allowing discretionary payment up to £12,000, which isn't a huge difference would be enough to empower people and get that better Public Relations the current government is lacking.

[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…

[news-buzz]

Decision made on free bus passes for pensioners | Personal Finance | Finance News Buzz

Despite fears the concessionary bus pass scheme for pensioners would be scrapped amid changes to the Winter Fuel Payment, the Department for Transport confirmed it will not axe the scheme. Transport Minister Simon Lightwood confirmed that the Government has “absolutely no plans” to withdraw the scheme when Conservative MP Graham Stuart asked if there were plans to continue to fund the…

[insidecroydon]

22% of older Londoners are living in poverty says AgeUK

Charity is offering special helpline for pensioners to make sure that they are able to claim the Winter Fuel Payment before December deadline One-fifth of over-50s in London are living in poverty, a higher proportion than any other part of England. Make sure you claim: pensioners who want to ensure that they receive the Winter Fuel Payment to which they are entitled need to make sure they apply…

[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.

[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