What are all pensioners getting another £300 this winter??

[F0RBIDDENFRUIT]

They are amongst the richest people in the country, yes there are poor pensioners but a lot of them are way richer than anyone else.

£300 more for energy, none of the old people I know need this, they all have more money than their children.

Just because they vote, that is the only reason they can be doing this.

For the last time, I will explain that people on the following benefits will get the COL payment:

Universal Credit,
Income-based JSA
Income related ESA,
Child Tax Credit
Working Tax Credit
Income Support

I will suggest that people in these groups will be younger than people of retirement age.

People of retirement age receiving Pension Credit will also get the COL payment.
All I did was find this information from the government online.

My DC are around your age, they are far better off than we were, even in relative terms, as are their friends. They had opportunities that we, who left school at 15, didn’t have, and we supported their choices. Our teenage DGCs have every chance of doing ok too.

The DCs aren’t counting on the state pension like we did, your/their generation has been made far more aware of the need to build a pension from an early age, and they have been fortunate to be able to do that.

We were also the first generation where the majority bought our homes. That means a lot of fifty somethings will inherit.

The £300 payment for pensioners is linked to the winter fuel payment eligibility which is based on age and so applies to almost all pensioners with a small number of exceptions. It is not based on being in receipt of pension credit unless you are referring to other payments.

I think pensioners need to realise that we are all finding it tough at the moment . Do you think they don’t? They have children and grandchildren, they know how mortgages and rents and fuel costs have gone up. They’re aware that inflation in food prices affects everyone.

@Seymour5 this resonates with me. I'm 57, and my parents (died last year in their early 80s) didnt go abroad (at all) until they were in their 40s, with us as teenagers. As teenagers I had very few possessions, and when i graduated and started work could move to new jobs around the country with my possessions in the boot of a Renault 5. My children (in their 20s, started going abroad virtually from birth, and when they moved to university had more possessions and consumer goods than i did by the time I was 30!
So in some ways people have gotten richer. The issue is with property isnt it? It's harder for them to buy. Until me and their dad die....
Opportunities too - my children have had far more than I did, and more still than my parents. Although my parents took huge risks in order to better themselves. My children seem

As a class I don't think they do, no. I think you overestimate the intergenerational understanding here as well as understanding between socio-economic groups.

Just to clarify for those confused - the normal WFA was always £300 per household (with someone over pension age living there) if a couple wanted their individual WFA and lived in the same household they could claim £150 each.
If the pensioner is over 80 - they got an extra £100 - total £400 (again per Household)

With the idea of a COL payment - the WFA (for originally 1 year only) was increased by £300 to £500 per household with an extra £100 for those over 80.
This has been extended into this year with the same amounts.

So far as I know people on pension credit get - the usual WFA + COL + the 3 payments of the £900 which have been paid to everyone on means tested benefits. The state pension not being a benefit in the same way is excluded from this extra £900.

Happy to be corrected on this if I have the figures wrong but that is the reality and as a single older pensioner the WFA is very welcome help no matter what the amount is. .

This is a screenshot from the GOV.UK website......
Pension Credit is no.4 on the list.

This.
All my friends who have grandchildren are doing full or part time child care for their children for free.
I know many women in their 60s who have been looking after elderly relatives for years, saving the state a lot of money.
I think we all understand that the majority of people are struggling at the moment.

I am wrong - with some of the figures. Up until 2022 the WFA was £200 for the under 80 household and £300 for the over 80 household. Because of the COL there was an extra amount added (originally for 1 year) and it has been extended for this year.

I completely agree. I am appalled at the way I country fails to support the disabled and their carers and I campaign for them. Attacking the elder’s pensions won’t help that though. The establishment wants group to blame each other, as that takes the focus off their policies. It shouldn’t be a race to the bottom.

is there no DLA?

Agree, many have no idea nor care.

As far as i can see, its an election bribe to keep the pensioners on side at the next GE.

Otherwise it would be tied to pension credits and then be able to give the poorest more help.

so ignorant of people who think all pensioners are well off
do you think all of those in their 50s are well off for example?

just sour grapes by the sound of things

I do think that pensioners need to realise that we are all finding it tough at the moment and are all experiencing the same rises in living costs.

Sorry but I find this sanctimonious 'I do think that pensioners need to realise' absolutely vile and beyond entitled. Your resentment is with the wrong people. The elderly have lived a life, many of them have been in poverty or at least struggled their whole lives. They know young people are struggling. They watch the news too. When many of those in their 80s/90s now were your age, they were working during a protracted period of eye-wateringly high unemployment, millions worked in heavy industry which collapsed, and they did not have the skills for 'new' industries (not that there were jobs for them anyway). And it wasn't just one person in your street. It was all your friends' dads too and your neighbours. Whole industries completely decimated and these men were hung out to dry. Wives working cash in hand with no workplace pension benefits, because they had no other option. And many of them didn't actually make it to retirement age because their workplace conditions were unsafe and quite simply not as 'pampered' as they are now. No holiday pay, no sick pay, constant threats of asbestos poisoning, unsafe machinery and generally physically working themselves to death, disability or severe illness. And if they were still alive, I can bet you they wouldn't be voting Tory. Thankfully as a Gen-Xer working conditions for us had changed as we came of age, but for many of us our parents (your "boomers" if you will) worked in very precarious conditions with a shocking life expectancy.

Eleganz · Today 13:06
Anonymouseposter · Today 13:00

As a class I don't think they do, no. I think you overestimate the intergenerational understanding here as well as understanding between socio-economic groups.

There is a massive class dimension but not the one you think there is @Eleganz There is a much larger lower middle/middle class now than there was even 30/40 years ago, and the attacks towards pensioners on this thread seem to be targeted at middle/upper class pensioners. Pensioners are not "a class" though, that's just nonsense. Maybe they are in the SE but they certainly aren't elsewhere.

Iwantmyoldnameback. I think that's better than leaving it with the government, wouldn't trust them with 30 pence.

Not the 30 pence that Lee Neanderthal says can pay for a meal?

Is of so hard to means test it? Pensioners I know are millionaires.

No its about providing help to those that need it the most, inc non pensioners.

If you can find a way to defend paying £300 to higher rate tax payers, good luck.

HMRC figures for 2022/23 revealed there were 7.7 million taxpayers aged 65+, with one in 10 of all taxpaying pensioners paying a rate of 40% or more. This is up from the 5.38 million recorded in 2012/13 where around one in 12 was paying the top rates of tax 10 Jan 2023

apologies if posted before.

And I think you are wrong, plenty of pensioners are helping out their families.

Have you read the thread? Both of these aspects have been thoroughly discussed.

How do so many people know their acquaintances are millionaires? It can only be property value and we've addressed that

There is no obligation for me to reveal this because it's my business and no-one else's. But I will.
I am of retirement age. My children are young adults.
My parents, I, and my children have experienced and are experiencing different social and economic times, and that will be the case for all generations.
Some things were/are better for one generation, some things were/are worse.
I don't need to reveal this either, but I do not vote Tory and did not vote for Brexit.
I despise the term "boomer" - it's childish and lazy, but equally I despise the term "snowflake".
I personally have done nothing to cause the economic difficulties faced by young adults today, (except maybe having the gall to be born in a particular era), and get pissed off being blamed for situations caused by government actions.
@Eleganz - when you say that you don't think "pensioners" realise that everyone is finding things tough right now, you do not speak for me, nor any of my friends, relatives, etc in my age group.
For example, compared to when I went to university, I am angry on behalf of today's students regarding tuition fees. I am angry that many young adults fear they will never be able to buy their own home.
I will vote according to which government I think will try to tackle these issues, and not just issues which might make my life better.
Threads which develop into generations sniping at each other help no-one.
We should all be working together to help life become more fair for everyone.
The "divide and conquer" ploy suits certain politicians extremely well.

Finally, for people still not understanding who is eligible to receive the COL payments, or Winter Fuel Payment, all you have to do is look at GOV.UK online. There is also a Cold Weather Payment, which is not the same as the WFT.
Posters having opposing opinions as to who should qualify and who shouldn't is one thing, (and yes, subjects such as this can engender some quite nasty comments on MN), but stating facts about entitlement to benefits which are actually incorrect is lazy and causes unnecessary conflict.

It would be easy in theory - tie it in with pension credits. The flaw in that is that a lot of pensioners who are entitled to pension credit don’t claim it because they think it’s charity.

pensioners are a huge age group
from late 50s to 100s

such ignorance

I think that a lot of pensioners do realise it, but what exactly are they supposed to do about it?
Direct your ire at successive governments, both here and in the US, who have spent the last 40-odd years funnelling money upwards.
Thatcher selling off all the council houses and not allowing councils to build more was the beginning of the housing crisis we have now. It worked as a bribe to voters but what a disaster
for the country. Most of them have ended up in the hands of private landlords.
I grew up in a small town where about half of the housing was council houses, now they're rarer than rocking horse shit.
They also encouraged the 'I'm alright Jack' mentality of every man for himself. The Social Contract, such as it was, has pretty much broken down.
Austerity and Brexit have ruined this country and I'm not sure if we'll recover in my lifetime.