Stop implying it's not so bad now because you grew up with no central heating and scraped ice off the windows.

[flashbac]

FFS

I also had no central heating in the house as a kid. There was a hole under the bathtub that cats would use to come in while you were freezing arse off on the loo. It was bloody grim. I don't wish it on anybody. People shouldn't have to be uncomfortable in their own bleeding homes for goodness sakes. It shouldn't be happening in this day and age. Stop defending it.

I think its helpful and reasonable to highlight that people are going to be able to cope with it and what the strategies are

We are employing them here at home, our mortgage didnt get paid this month due to having no money, Im sitting here with a blanket on and last night had 2 water bottles, socks and the like.

We're trying to have a look at our money this weekend (or lack of it) but equally I am not going to give over any more cash to the heating companies than I need to, so am putting in place things to prevent me getting uncomfortable or paying them more than I need to

It is dangerous for some people, and people do die due to temperature problems but whatever means we have to discuss what we can do its helpful.

I survived it in the 70s, hopefuly albeit a lot older now I will survive again.

Sometimes when people say this, they don't mean 'Stop whining'.
They mean- it sucks but it was normal 40 years ago. We all knew how to layer clothes and use hot water bottles. It's survivable.
Chilblains were normal. We've become used to a very comfortable way of living, but we can manage being less comfortable.

Some younger folk think it's uniquely, unreasonably awful, and don't have the old fashioned skills of preserving heat indoors. Us oldies can share from our youth, in a blitz spirit fashion.

@CaptainMyCaptain I disagree, anyone who voted for this current incarnation of the Conservative party is in agreement with their policies, as it has been clear for over a decade now that they are happy to increase inequality, and what is happening now is the chickens coming home to roost.

Whenever someone posts on here saying they are working full time in a low paid job and can't afford to live, there will be plenty of posters saying to get a better job, or that you can expect to be able to afford things like télévision and a car on low pay. It's not too much of a leap from that to "you can't expect to be able to afford to have the heating on with low pay."

plenty of people in this country are perfectly happy for anyone they see as "deserving poor" to have a life that is a constant struggle.

I lived in a rented single glazed house with just a downstairs gas fire and a small gas wall heater upstairs until a few years ago. I was always freezing and used to go to bed in the winter as soon as I got home from work.

I realise I'm lucky not to be living like that now and I'm angry that others are.

Agree. Had some utterly miserable winters as a kid. Huddled around a gas fire in one room, not being able to get warm in bed no matter how many layers. Think we should be economical with resources but people should be able to afford to keep their homes warm enough. It's shite.

I survived it in the 70s, hopefuly albeit a lot older now I will survive again.

"Hopefully I'll survive" is not really you want to hear about day-to-day living conditions in the UK, is it?

What were the death rates and health conditions like back then?

Saying "we survived" is 'survivor bias' - you aren't talking about those who didn't survive, who struggled.

Because they aren't around to tell you their experiences.

@RancidOldHag

Yes, everyone should be securely housed and warm enough.

This phrase isn't usually used to mean that they shouldn't be.

It's used to remind people that we haven't got it uniquely tough, and that it was just as bad (fuel crisis, inflation) in the 1970s

We coped then. We'll cope now.

And perhaps between times we will learn to make the changes when the country does have money to make a difference

Can we clarify what 'make a difference' actually means? It sounds good but what is the aim in practice?

Lots of us grew up in those cold conditions- it wasn’t ok then and it’s not ok now.

I’ve seen loads of comments on here about how people are “too comfortable” now blah blah. It’s the new version of the competitive undereating threads.

“Oh 5 degrees is positively TROPICAL!! I’d be sweating in my house. We only turn the heating on once a year on Christmas Day and for no longer than 45 seconds.” Cue virtual head tilt and tinkly laugh*

*disclaimer: my rage is fuelling my imagination.

No one deserves to feel cold. It’s as simple as that. What happened in the past is irrelevant.

@noblegiraffe

Bet the people posting this pompous shit are not having to choose between heating and eating, and are not having to scrape ice off the inside of their windows.

Yep. It's poverty porn. In reality, cold damp homes will see a massive rise in people suffering with respiratory conditions, especially in young children and the elderly. But no one reminiscing about the glorious olden days seems to have made any connection between living conditions and lower life expectancy/poorer health in the people who live there.

I agree no-one should be uncomfortable in their own homes. That is why if I was Chancellor I would have reduced domestic energy bills by zero VAT or some other way, instead of fuel duty which has only partly been passed on to the consumer.

Everyone needs electricity in their home, not everyone uses a car. You can walk or cycle or reduce your journeys to save money, you cannot easily significantly reduce your domestic energy consumption comfortably.

*A lot of people are used to overheating their homes and expect to be able to wear tshirts in winter.

*A lot of people are suffering because they can't afford to heat their homes.

Both of those statements can be true, they just refer to different people. I remember being very cold as a child (always had chilblains and chapped backs of knees) but I never went hungry. So many people now are hungry AND cold and it's down to this government.

I have just been reading a news article on Facebook about a woman who was interviewed on This Morning talking about how her family will struggle with the energy rises.
She was saying she's stopped using her car and got rid of her tumble drier etc, basically she's done everything she can to save money but she's still struggling.

The comments were full of people doing the competitive poor childhood thing.
"I had to sleep in a bedroom with ice on the windows and I survived!"
"Well I had to sleep in a bedroom with ice on the window and one threadbare blanket and ate one meal a day but I didn't do me any harm!"
"Yeah well I lived in Elsa's ice Palace and ate nothing but snowballs and walked to school in bare feet and it didn't hurt me!"
🙄🙄
It's so tedious.

Most of the comments were terrible, all about how the mother (its always the mother's fault) should have kept her legs together and not had kids and ranting about lazy scroungers not wanting to work and expecting handouts. How they couldn't be that badly off because the woman didn't look starving
The parents were married, both worked and didn't claim benefits.
Their 17 Yr old daughter was in the comments trying to defend her mother and fighting a losing battle. I felt really sorry for her.

Has chilblains as a child in the 70s , just thought it was normal. Life should have improved since then. I'm now making massive cutbacks with regards to energy use. But it's miserable.

It was awful then and even more awful now. I cannot believe that people are having to go without heat when they need it. I'm not talking about people who are used to walking about in T shirts year round but people who are genuinely cold. This is not bloody Victorian times ! As a child I had bronchitis every single winter due to a cold damp home and I seriously hope we are not heading back to this sort of existence.

Nobody said "It's not so bad".

WE said, we did it before and it's not the end of the world; it's completely survivable by ordinary people. Which is true.

I agree.
The biggest motivating factor for me to do well in school was to get a better paid job than my parents, so that I could have the heating on when I got cold not when it was allowed to be on. And to be able to have a bath with more than a few inches of hot water.
I could go on.

But the main point is that we're not supposed to be going backwards. THAT'S the shock. That, and the way it's hitting those of us who wouldn't have been hit when we were younger, if our parents had the jobs we have now. If that makes sense.

“Not the end of the world”

“Completely survivable”

Are the Tories succeeding in their stated aim to “level up”?

As others have said, I think there’s a difference between those who are posting practical survivability advice to help people who think they’ll be irresolvably miserable without gas heating - and those who are doing that annoying jolly-along four Yorkshiremen stuff.

We probably do need to think about whether burning a non renewable, increasingly unaffordable fuel to heat poorly insulated spaces is the best way of meeting the need of ‘keep the humans warm, happy and healthy’. Again, there are ways to post about that without scolding or shaming worried, cold people who are trying to fulfil a basic human need.

@2bazookas

Nobody said "It's not so bad".

WE said, we did it before and it's not the end of the world; it's completely survivable by ordinary people. Which is true.

I agree, I think people are muddling up what they think people are saying and what people are saying

I also think that expectation management is called for at times, we are a first nation, western, rich country. But that has been the case for a couple of centuries now

However, did people in 1900 say 'well its 1900, I cant believe we're still living like its 1850'? Because some people in 1900 were still living like it was 1850, just like in 1950 some people were still living like it was 1900. So yes, for some of us, parts of our lives are still like it was in 1970, ie high inflation, lack of fuel etc

Time will move on, but equally people need to vote the right way, you cant vote tory over and over and expect that the more vulnerable in society and public services are protected.

I think what the posts are saying is that living in a cold house is doable. And people who've done that know this. If we can't afford the rises in energy costs then we need to make changes. Some people aren't used to putting on jumpers and wearing socks in the house. My husband who was born in the 60's has never lived in a house without central heating.

I think the difference is also that, even though it was shit then, it was better than what had come before.
Grandfather: full on poor. Stealing coal from trains etc for the fire. Grandmother: one of 75 children and a piano in a miniscule terrace in Liverpool.
Mum: grew up in a house with one fire. Single glazing.
Me: double glazing when I was about 10. Central heating, but never above 60. Kwik save everything.
Me as a student: always cold.
Me as an adult: tesco shopping. Heating on when it feels cold. Even in the afternoon, if I feel like it.
Now: back to childhood and possibly worse. Mainly because I have pretty impressive reynauds and my joints ache and become stiff in the cold, despite being correct weight and active.

[quote Pissyduck]@CaptainMyCaptain I disagree, anyone who voted for this current incarnation of the Conservative party is in agreement with their policies, as it has been clear for over a decade now that they are happy to increase inequality, and what is happening now is the chickens coming home to roost.

Whenever someone posts on here saying they are working full time in a low paid job and can't afford to live, there will be plenty of posters saying to get a better job, or that you can expect to be able to afford things like télévision and a car on low pay. It's not too much of a leap from that to "you can't expect to be able to afford to have the heating on with low pay."

plenty of people in this country are perfectly happy for anyone they see as "deserving poor" to have a life that is a constant struggle.[/quote]
I never said any of those things so I'm not sure what you are disagreeing with and I didn't vote Tory.

It shouldn't be like this but here we are and those of us who grew up like that just might have something helpful to share.

Sometimes when people say this, they don't mean 'Stop whining'. They mean- it sucks but it was normal 40 years ago. We all knew how to layer clothes and use hot water bottles. It's survivable
Exactly that. We're not talking about freezing so bad you get chilblains but we have certain got accustomed to a level of temperature in their home that can certainly be reduced without risking our health.

When I moved with my OH, it was a bit if a battle as he was used to much lower temperature than I. As it is, I got used to it and I'm now the one who needs even less heat. We only heat the downstairs living room a few hours morning and evening and same with bathroom. We don't hear the bedrooms at all. We have heated blankets we put on just before bed and then turn off and we love our bottle waters.

We keep active, walk, and exercise. I think except for the elderly and disabled, most family could adjust to having less heating on.

Some people aren't used to putting on jumpers and wearing socks in the house.

Oh gosh yes, I’m sure the people who are choosing between eating and heating will be relieved to hear that putting on socks will sort that dilemma.