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.

@Hugasauras

It's also just another layer of exhaustion for people living in poverty or skirting the poverty line. Taken in isolation, turning down the heating or reducing your food bill a bit isn't really a big deal. But when every single thing you have do is a struggle, when every day you just have to try and get through and know that tomorrow will be exactly the same or even worse, then adding something else on top, even something that might seem minor, is an incredible weight. So many people have to live joyless and absolutely crushingly exhausting lives because of the battle to just survive day to day.

One of the most eloquent posts I've ever read.

12 years ago when I was single and owned a house in my own, the oil tank started leaking, so I had no heating (fireplaces were blocked up) for 2 (maybe 3) winters with record lows (-15C on the coldest night).

It was miserable, but I was working full time and as I was single could easily sleep over at various friends houses when it got too cold. But this wouldn't work for the elderly, disabled or young families and would have been a dangerous situation, and I have no doubt with the way heating oil prices have been over the last month there are plenty of households living like this.

Next winter is going to be miserable and scary for some if the government don't sort out the scandalous profits creamed off by energy companies.

@vdbfamily

I think you are being a bit unreasonable. Given the choice, my 3 teenagers would have our house heated constantly at 21° . DH and I both grew up in houses heated by open fires and an aga in kitchen. We have hearing at 17/18 and only for a couple of hours morning and evening. We dress warmly if cold and have a pile of blankets to snuggle under if watching TV etc. My daughter's appear in knickers and crop tops moaning about how freezing it is and we tell them to go and put some clothes on and stop being ridiculous. However, being constantly freezing, even when dressed warmly is miserable so there needs to be a balance. I have a friend who moans about the cost of heating and she had it on all the time at about 22°. I cannot spend any time in her house as so warm and study.

I'm sitting here in a woolly hat and two jumpers with a hot water bottle. When I had my heating on in the winter, the highest I ever had it was 19. I'm dependent on disability benefits.im selling my house and moving to a smaller one which will cost less to heat (from 3 beds to 2). But conveyancing will take another two or three months at least.

My living room is 12 degrees today and it's just been hailing.

If you voted Tory, you are culpable. I judge you.
Disabled people and elderly have been dying needlessly for over a decade now. And yet folk still vote Tory. Hang your selfish heads in shame.

The “back in my day” attitude is gross. What cos you went without means you want your kids or grandkids to go without? I guess misery likes company though.

I agree.

Thankfully I was never cold as a child but I house shared with a few friends in freezing flats where there was a fire and no central heating.

Bloody baltic. Hated it.

I hate to think of families being cold.
So basic.

Yup, born in the fifties, no heating, ice on inside windows, 3 day weeks, miners strikes, high interest rates etc.
Don’t want to go back to that, I like my central heating, automatic washing machine and every other mod con thank you very much.

@Manicsfan

If you voted Tory, you are culpable. I judge you. Disabled people and elderly have been dying needlessly for over a decade now. And yet folk still vote Tory. Hang your selfish heads in shame.

This! Stop bashing older people who have told you this was going to happen. It was fine when it was others but now its you,you dont like it. Boo hoo

@Manicsfan

If you voted Tory, you are culpable. I judge you. Disabled people and elderly have been dying needlessly for over a decade now. And yet folk still vote Tory. Hang your selfish heads in shame.

Damn right!! I’m fed up of being polite about it. I’m fed up of the “I’m alright Jack” attitude of too many people. I used to politely change the subject if friends/ colleagues/ neighbors spouted any right wing Tory nonsense. Now I shoot them down in flames. A neighbor I walk my dog with started it the other day, I gave him short shrift. I’m fucking sick of these idiots.

I had a taste of this at the end of November when storm Arwen hit us. 8 days with no electric. Which due to how rural we are meant no heating, no water either as we get it from a borehole which is powered by an electric pump. House is extremely drafty and its only part double glazed and the glazing is old so doesn't do the job anyway.

Did we survive only due to the kindness of my dhs 87 year old Nan and eventually northern powergrid putting us up in a hotel for 2 night. Doing this with a 6 year old and a 3 year old, who cannot stay under a blanket nor want to keep a hat on was awful. We had the fire going going but due to the fact our living room door has never closed we couldn't block the heat in either.

I am lucky that we may skip various luxuries and our food may be basic and meal planned. I have the ability to fill our oil tank. I am scared at the moment as i plan our deliveries and pay monthly by DD. They have changed the conyract and are going to decide for me when i need a top and then look at the dd quarterly rather than the beginning of the year. I am scared that they are going to whack my DD up to something that is not affordable.

My room is 5c, sleeting here. It’s not hit 15c in months. Winter 2020/21 I could afford any hour a day when really bad.

I can’t afford heating, my benefits won’t stretch to the increase in standing charge, never mind per unit and it’s not just electric but water too - the money the government allows for single person on benefits is far lower than my bills. I’ve nowhere else I can save. And my gp surgery have written to say medication and devices (splints/blood sugar monitors) available elsewhere inc online must now be purchased due to nhs financial pressures. I’m on daily meds for suicide risk. Clearly not much longer and the combination, even if I could pay, I cannot buy due to danger they present.

Bright side? Think of the money I’ll save them being dead.

I’m not alone in that. Had messages this morning from others in same position. One has sleep apnoea and can’t afford to run her machine every night AND is now expected to pay for meds. Certainly cannot afford heating. She’s been admitted twice this winter with hypothermia.

I can't believe someone up-thread actually referenced the fucking Blitz Spirit. FFS when is this country going to get over its pathetic, destruction obsession with how we got through the bloody war, which none of us on this thread actually experienced??

YANBU OP. I'm sick of reading some of the ridiculous responses to people's genuine worries on here. But I guess taking us back to the 70s is what 'we' voted for in 2016...

And fwiw, I'm wearing two woollen sweaters and 3 pairs of socks, I'm sitting under a blanket with a hot water bottle - and I still have chilblains!

@Manicsfan @MissyB1 I totally agree. Tory AND Brexit as the two are inextricably linked and part of the same narrative.

@AuntieMarys

I agree. I grew up in the 60s with only 2 gas fires downstairs, no heating upstairs an immersion heater...it was grim. I'm a firm believer in wearing layers and being sensible regarding heating. But those conditions were awful.

Same era, same set up, quite a big Victorian house. You could have a Dimplex oil radiator in your bedroom if you were ill with mumps/measles/scarlet fever in the winter. Yes, it was OK because a) we were children and b) we knew nothing else.

I still prefer it chilly and hate having the heating ramped up because of my unwell husband and will hate it even more when the bills come in, monthly DD has already more than doubled. However...it is appalling to think of people being cold, especially kids and those who are old/vulnerable. It is not doom mongering to say there will be needless and avoidable deaths. That is a tragedy and we should not be anticipating it in 2022, in the UK.

@Manicsfan

If you voted Tory, you are culpable. I judge you. Disabled people and elderly have been dying needlessly for over a decade now. And yet folk still vote Tory. Hang your selfish heads in shame.

Oh judge away. You should be thanking us tbh. If the 2019 election had gone the other way (I know I know, no chance with that leader) we'd be in a much worse position.

@Scoobygang7

I had a taste of this at the end of November when storm Arwen hit us. 8 days with no electric. Which due to how rural we are meant no heating, no water either as we get it from a borehole which is powered by an electric pump. House is extremely drafty and its only part double glazed and the glazing is old so doesn't do the job anyway.

Did we survive only due to the kindness of my dhs 87 year old Nan and eventually northern powergrid putting us up in a hotel for 2 night. Doing this with a 6 year old and a 3 year old, who cannot stay under a blanket nor want to keep a hat on was awful. We had the fire going going but due to the fact our living room door has never closed we couldn't block the heat in either.

I am lucky that we may skip various luxuries and our food may be basic and meal planned. I have the ability to fill our oil tank. I am scared at the moment as i plan our deliveries and pay monthly by DD. They have changed the conyract and are going to decide for me when i need a top and then look at the dd quarterly rather than the beginning of the year. I am scared that they are going to whack my DD up to something that is not affordable.

Poor you.

We are on a bore hole too, and have a blocked up fireplace, and lost power for 23 hours in the storm after Arwen and that was bad enough. I put DD in playgroup/preschool on what would normally be her day off, and went to Tesco cafe, put the car on charge there (forgot to charge before storm - lesson learned) and drunk tea and used the internet.

DH stayed at home in the cold and semi dark and liaised with the electricity companies.

I can't believe someone up-thread actually referenced the fucking Blitz Spirit. FFS when is this country going to get over its pathetic, destruction obsession with how we got through the bloody war, which none of us on this thread actually experienced??

@UnnecessaryFennel I was at the blitz reference as well. What an odd parallel to draw. The money is there for people to be warm, fed, and housed.

Sorry you have chilblains

My mum grew up in a freezing cold house with no central heating. She wouldn’t wish that on her worst enemy.

My dm is ridiculously frugal with her central heating but she cranks it up when we visit as she can’t bear the thought of us being cold (I wish she gave herself the same consideration). To this day she insists on warming our coats on the radiators before we leave when it’s cold out (this includes dh and I who are big enough to warm our own coats if required) and she used to become visibly upset if the kids hands or feet ever felt cold. Ds refused to keep mittens or gloves on and she really struggled with this. My mum has never really spoken about her childhood and I used to get quite cross as I saw her cold fixation as one of her silly foibles but one of my aunties explained how cold they all were in winter when they were growing up. It has clearly affected them all.

These were not the good old days. Times were hard for many and children suffered. Why on earth would we think this is acceptable now? The absolute minimum standard for all in a wealthy society should be a warm dry home and enough food. We need to do better.

@RightOnTheEdge

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.

People were commenting on the fact that she has six children.

@Becca19962014 I'm so bloody sorry

YANBU - I currently have no heating because we’re having work done. It’s fucking freezing, but at least I know that in a week, the heating will be back. There are people who go through this on a daily basis, permanently, and it’s fucking outrageous!

@JaniieJones

You're joking surely?
How much mental gymnastics have you had to do to convince yourself that things would be worse in a hypothetical Labour government.
This is why things don't get better. Because people cling on to the small amount they have because they believe these arseholes in power that other (read poorer/migrant etc)people are trying to take it away from them.
You end up diddling yourself (and everyone else) out of a better quality of life.

I agree. It matters not how things were in bygone days, we live in the here and now.

When we were kids in very cold weather all of us slept in the sitting room with one pathetic small coal fire that warmed nothing. It was hot water bottles that stopped us having frostbite.

I always assumed things would improve over the years and they have in a lot of respects but this country is so shite in so many ways, it's depressing as hell.

Peoples quality of life has been eroded and eroded and there is no way to stop it seemingly.