Genuine question re pensioner fuel payment cut

I bet he wouldn’t have called her that if she’d taken the money from families with small children. He’ll just have to cut down on the pub visits, won’t he?

But those that worked all their life and don't get pension credit but the basic state pension don't get it.

Labour has managed to punish the lowest paid for working. These pensioners would have been better off not working. It is madness.

One of the very unhappy pensioners in the pub this week was calling the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Thieves which seems to sum things up well.

Maybe the level should have been set at the personal allowance so only those pensioners who don’t pay tax get it?

So let's not punish poor pensioners, let's work to support the most vulnerable in society.

Fuck me, I'm sounding more socialist than our current government.

My mum is on pension credit, so I think she will still receive this. I know not everyone is in the same position as her but she has nearly 10 k in the bank, money under her mattres, money in a couple of cupboards around her house and she’s just paid for my Daughters driving lessons. She’s worked around about 5 years of her working life.
To me this seems madness

Agree the threshold is too low. I'm really surprised labour did this. I work for a charity for older people and many now feel really worried about what is to come next. Agree with waht previous poster said though about Pension credit threshold, it is not this low for many. If a pensioner gets a disability benefit ( and judging by the number of AA form I complete a month) many many do and this pulls many more people into being eligible for Pension credit with a much higher income than 11k.

@yeesh MN is dominated by the middle class so they have wealthier parents. and I agree completely with you. I volunteer at a food project and see just how poor some pensioners are.

It's not intergenerational hatred.

It's intergenerational unfairness. It needs to be tackled.

https://www.if.org.uk/research-posts/left-behind-a-decade-of-decline/

Winter Fuel Allowance would not be necessary if.........wait for it........the cost of energy, (you know, because people have the sheer audacity to want to be warm, clean, and able to cook), was not so extortionately high, and unaffordable for many.
Or is that too simplistic?

As a staunch Labour voter I feel it goes against the spirit of standing up for non means tested benefits. Re Tories and pensioners, they took away the free tv licence.

There are things they could have done to rethink the winter fuel payment. When an elderly relative passed away before the payment of the winter fuel payment, their daughter was given the payment as part of the estate because her parent was still living in the qualifying week. Things like that don’t need to happen.

With all benefits there is a line and whilst the two women pensioners in my road who I am friendly with will be fine there are plenty who will be a few pounds over pension credit limits who will suffer. Plus triple lock, all this intergenerational hatred maybe people wanting it to end will one day if lucky enough live to a great age and regret their calling for it.

Means testing benefits is far too expensive plus assets can be liquid or not. So means testing is never ever perfect.

We’re debating a particular state benefit

That’s not necessarily the case - they could be 62 for example and not in great health. Also uc claimants get less than half the state pension/pension credits to live on and generally don’t have savings.

A single person on uc is in much worse poverty than pensioners.

Well, well, well, another excuse to bash pensioners. Shocker.

I think it is disgraceful whoever is doing it. On MN everyone will say that their parents have loads of money, don’t need it etc etc but most pensioners do not. They are really struggling, state pension is very low and not many qualify for pension credit. I work for social services and we get hundreds and hundreds of calls every winter from people who can not afford to heat their homes. This will just make it worse. Not to mention the cost of means testing these benefits and the costs that are passed on to local authorities who have to pick up the pieces when people can’t afford heat and food

I don't care who does this. It needs to be done.

As an age group pensioners are wealthier than other groups. They consume more services and they need to be contributing - don't tell me they already did - it's not true, and it's not enough.

We all need to be paying more so that we can invest in public services and the future - which will benefit all of us.

I do wish Labour would start increasing Capital gains tax, tax on second homes, tax on wealth rather than starting at the bottom.

Not if they are eligible for the full state pension at £221.20 a week.

So £11502.4 a year.

It's cheaper to do it this way rather than a proper means testing which would end up costing much of the expected savings although that would have been much fairer.

Axing the benefit from any pensioners paying higher rate tax would have been better.

The cost of bureaucracy is one of the reasons prescriptions are free in Wales. Nothing to do with socialist values and everything to do with the cost of collecting the payment charges. So many in Wales qualify for free prescriptions (which is shocking in itself) that it's cheaper to not charge the much smaller proportion who would normally pay.

And yes if the Tories had done it they would have been pilloried. Labour get away with a lot that the Tories don't. Taxing of pension investments has seriously reduced the value of people's private pensions and it was Labour who introduced University fees.

Definitely the Christmas bonus should go, that would generate £110 million.

I’m not a Labour supporter so I can’t speak for how they would react if it was the Tories who cut this payment to pensioners.

I do support means testing of pretty much all public payments and services, however, so I was surprised when this was announced by a Labour government (albeit I would echo other posters in that perhaps the cut off is too low and will push some pensioners into poverty and/or ill health if they can’t afford to heat their homes).

Those with the full basic pension have worked or cared for someone long enough to get the full pension. They have done enough.

For you maybe. What about pensioners who are struggling? What about the £10 Christmas bonus, would you like to see that go as well? I thought it was the Tories who were supposed to be the "nasty party", seems like Labour are going after the vulnerable too.

I am a supporter of the withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance, even though I used to get it. I prefer the money to be targeted at those who really need the financial support. It seems folly to me for the £200 to go to all pensioners as many are wealthy and it just means a free meal out of couple of bottles of champagne!

In exactly the same way as I have to this. That I'm broadly supportive as it was beyond ridiculous that wealthy people recieved it. However I would have preferred a genuine means test to have been applied rather than the arbitrary cut off of not being on a passport benefit. SRP is not a lot of money if that's all you get and while it can take you a few pence over the PC threshold, it could still be a struggle without the WFP. I accept a full application process and means test would be expensive and difficult to implement though. So I think my preference would be to set the income eligibility cut off at a higher level after taking advice from anti poverty groups as to what that should be. There's so much data that could have informed this to ensure those who needed it didn't go without while also not wasting money where it wasn't required.