To wonder why child benefit is now means tested but winter fuel payments aren't.

[ImagineJL]

I can see the argument for reducing and removing child benefit for high earners (despite the fact that I am losing money myself), but why not apply the same principle to winter fuel payments? A colleague of mine is a hospital consultant, earning over 100k a year, so has just lost all his child benefit. But he still gets his winter fuel payment.

It seems a bit strange.

Outraged thats like saying that it's unfair that higher rate tax payers don't get working tax credits because they have worked hard to get a good job and are paying more tax, so they should reap the benefits in free handouts from the state that they don't need.

I have two grandmothers still living. One was a head teacher and came from a well off family. She worked hard all her life and has a modest but comfortable lifestyle. She does not need the WFA.

The other grandmother came from a very, very poor family in the Birmingham slums. She also worked hard all her life, as did my granddad, but because they were living on low wages (despite getting the best qualifications they could have expected with the education they received),they had no money to save towards their retirement except my granddad's company pension. This is a very small amount of money now received by my grandmother and she needs other help from the state to live on, including the WFA.

Please don't insult old people who have worked hard all their life but nevertheless been UNABLE to save much towards their retirement. Well off pensioners don't need WFA, poor ones do - regardless of whether you put them in the category of deserving or undeserving poor. If well off pensioners weren't getting this free money they don't need, we'd be able to give those feckless poor ones you're thinking about enough money to see they don't die of hypothermia this winter.

Exactly Provincial but I doubt the really poor OAPs are Tory voters soooooo who cares far better to chuck money away on cruises,meals out,endless crap for the house and M&S food.

If you work, chances are you don't heat your house all day. Most pensioners do need to heat their house all day in winter.

It is absolutely NOT a simple black and white scenario of those who have saved (who apparently should be congratulated) and those who have not saved (who are apparently feckless and irresponsible). Sure - some people may have frittered away what they might otherwise have saved but I feel sure that most people without savings are in that position because they couldn't afford to save - either because they were in low paid work (someone has to do it and low paid work is often still hard work and made all the more so, psychologically, because there's little reward!) or because their family circumstances meant they couldn't maximise their earning potential (am thinking carers for example).

There are 100s of 1000s, probably millions in that position today. Working their arses off (if they're lucky to have a job) to afford to live (or exist, depending on your definition of "living") on a day to day basis, who have nothing left over for savings, and nothing more they can cut back on. I would love to know what people in that position should be doing to provide for their old age ?

My ex MIL (thank god she's very much an ex) didn't work "hard" - or at all for that matter, from the age of 30. She was, however, as a comparatively young widow in her 60s, able to sell the huge house that she was rattling around in for c. £800k, (that had cost £12k 35 years before), buy a very nice 3 bed that was still arguably much larger than she alone needed for c. £300k and bank about half a million thank you very much. None of that was due to much effort on her part, nor was her bank balance due to diligent saving - but someone like that who usually spends the bloody UK winter in South Africa anyway still gets the WFA - which is obscene .... and to suggest that she somehow "deserves" it because on the face of it she has "saved" for her old age is even more so.

That Jeremy Paxman article makes depressing reading.

I agree about people like your ex-mil, catsmother. We are the only family in a road of large family houses (ours is the smallest!). All the other occupants are retired. One silly woman bragged to me that she and her dh had got their house valued "just for fun" and it was worth £1.3m when they had paid £62.000 for it. In the very next breath she moaned that her son and his wife couldn't afford a decent house. These people just don't get it.

Otoh, where would the economy be without pensioners? You should see their trolleys in Waitrose. And who goes on all the exotic holidays and spends £££ in John Lewis every week for something to do?

Mind you, a further thought... if I am going to be means tested to the nth degree, I'm going to sell the house and go round and round on a cruise ship till the money runs out. The govt have got to be careful that people don't all start doing this.

What really gets my goat is many wealthy women pensioners never,ever worked-they didn't have to.My mil has never,ever had a job.Show me a family today who enjoys that luxury.

Soooo mil certainly didn't work all her life for her WFA or her bus pass(which she never uses as they have a car each)etc.

At the grand old age of 44 I've only had 4 years not working(which we're now feeling the cost of).Basically we're all working our backsides off so the likes of mil can enjoy her cruises,holidays and endless shopping expeditions spending £££££ on gold coloured crap in extortionate garden centres and home county dept stores without a thought for her son who hasn't had a holiday in years who works his arse off,cycles miles to save cash and will spend this winter shivering.

Hacked off-you bet I am.

Polkadotcircus- you have said everything I would want to say and probably so much better! My bloody in-laws are typical of the pensioners who retired at 50, have had a very comfortable life, lots of benefits and are very selfish yet think our generation have it easy.

'"saved for their future"you mean been lucky enough to have jobs with extremely generous pension plans the like of which our generation will never see'

Are you not aware than lots of people saved into their own private pensions because they didn't have jobs with generous provision? That is, nobody else put money in apart from them. Is that why Gordon Brown was allowed to start taxing the pensions of self-employed people, because nobody realised that some of us have made very real sacrifices every month to pay into our pensions? Because nobody else was going to! When I retire I am resigned to the fact that there probably won't be any state help for me. Now I'm wondering why I was so darn stupid as to save for my own retirement, even when the chancellor started taxing it. Because I could have been having much more fun spending the money on things like decent shoes or a car that wasn't always years old.

Abra lucky you could afford to do so.With the cost of living these days it's virtually impossible for many people to do the same particularly when we're chucking money away on people who don't need it.

Maybe wallpaper boy has shares in Saga holidays.

I could afford to (and continue to do, as I am only 48) despite earning a small salary with a husband who has been unemployed for 18 months. We have two teenagers to support as well. But I am starting to wonder if it is a waste of money.

Well we certainly couldn't pay any more than we already are and neither could the vast majority I suspect.Have been having pension worries convos with several friends.Any spare cash we have eventually will need to go towards the dc and uni as they won't get the max living expenses loans.

Dp worked out that to get the equivalent of what a retired teacher gets now he'd have to pay 3/4 of his salary-not sure the mortgage,food bills etc will pay themselves.

While there are people today who can't afford to pay into their pensions, there were people in the baby boomer generation that couldn't afford to either. Just as there are people from both generations that could afford to pay into a pension but choose not to.

I don't think the fact that people struggle to pay into a pension nowadays is very relevant.

There are people that get other benefits that could afford to live without them, so why should this one be any different?

Until we get to the stage where we give people the absolute bare minimum to live on, and limit benefits that can be claimed to one or two children, we shouldn't be taking away the only benefit that some elderly people get. If they have paid in, they should be able to take out. The system has to be beneficial for everyone, not just poor people.

The point is we are all meant to be in it together. The whole child benefit thing was ummed and aahed over, but many will lose it now and I think the elderly should be treated no differently.

It's not the only benefit that elderly people get. If they paid NI they get a pension, which they are entitled to.

He didn't touch the WFA or free bus passes, of course.

'Do people who think WTF should be means tested also think that rich pensioners should have to pay for health care if they can afford to? Or for having their rubbish taken away? If not, what's the difference - those rich pensioners are receiving 'free' services they could afford to pay for (not really free of course)? But I think most people would think those services should be universally provided free of charge. I don't really understand why universal benefits attract criticism that universal services do not.'

Because there's no juxtaposition. NHS care is provided through NI contributions. Rubbish collection is paid for through council tax.

'Until we get to the stage where we give people the absolute bare minimum to live on, and limit benefits that can be claimed to one or two children, we shouldn't be taking away the only benefit that some elderly people get. If they have paid in, they should be able to take out. The system has to be beneficial for everyone, not just poor people.'

It's not the only benefit. And plenty of pensioners now, mostly females, have never paid a been into the system. So by your line of thinking - the government as a bank: pay in, take out - they shouldn't get any state pension at all. Or, all people should only get a state pension equivalent to exactly what they put in and nothing more.

And everyone is 'taking out'. We have a peaceful country with a stable government and excellent infrastructure. Yet so many people don't see the benefit of that at all, they see 'taking out' or 'getting back' only in terms of £'s in their hands. Very simplistic.

No all 3 said CB wouldn't be touched.

David Cameron's exact words were: ?I like the child benefit, I wouldn?t change child benefit, I wouldn?t means-test it.?

I wouldn't mind so much if they were cutting it fairly, but giving it to families on joint incomes of up to 100k is taking the piss in my opinion. This grates more so when they bang on about it being removed from the top 10% of earners. This clearly isn't the case though. A single earner family on 60k with 4 kids will lose over 3k a year. A double income family on 98k will lose nothing. There is nothing fair about this policy. If, however, CB can be removed in this manner from families with mortgages, rent, commuter costs, and extra little people to feed and clothe, then I don't see why WFA can't be removed in the same 'crude' manner. After all, it's not as if pensioners have big mortgages or rents and commuter costs and children to bring up.

Exactly Ihate,well summed up.The crude unfairness is very worrying.