To not understand the uproar over winter fuel allowance being cut?

[virgocatlover]

It's not being cut. The poorest pensioners on pension credit will still get it. It's only being changed so it's no longer a universal payment anymore.

The energy price cap was £1834 October 2023. This October it's £1717. So it's £117 cheaper than it was last winter for average use.

In April 2024 the state pension rose by 8.5% - a rise of around £900 for those on full state pension. It's expected to rise another £400 next April.

Many energy companies still have schemes for those in genuine need. Plus the warm home discount exists for those on a low income.

I understand pensions who receive just state pension and no other income may be annoyed but there has to be a cut somewhere. But pensioners are unlikely to have the expense of rent/ mortgages in retirement which is the biggest expense to those of working age.

However most of the moans I've heard and seen seem to be from the well off pensioners who are cross about losing something. I know a woman who rents out three houses and spends the winter in the Caribbean who is spitting feathers about losing the payment. Another who spent the money on their Christmas booze.

There is so much uproar about this which didn't happen when there were so many other cuts affecting young people/workers/families. All other benefits are means tested, so should WFA.

People still see pensioners as those who fought in the war and counting pennies at the till to pay for their bread and milk. But that's just not the case these days.

Yea fuck those moaning biddies innit op.

Like my entitled mum who gets just under the limit to qualify for pension credit and has the pension increases sucked away by now paying £3 for a snide jar of gravy to make the packet mash and tinned carrots more palatable. And before you say she can eat fresh veg, no she can't. She can't peel them. And can't walk very far so has to taxi everywhere if I'm not around, which has increased in cost too. But haha, she can walk 100m in about 25 mins some days so she doesn't qualify for disability benefits.

Fancy someone like her being upset she's losing the payment eh? Should be grateful she's still alive.

I personally disagree with cutting universal fuel allowance, I’m simply pointing out that once someone has a benefit, more often than not, they expect it to continue, and get upset once it’s cut.

Removing the single person council tax discount is a different kettle of fish and a proposal I would not agree with.

I could see why it wasn't viable to be universal. I guess there are some people just about managing but not entitled to pension credit who could struggle. Maybe they could have made the threshold higher?
There are thousands of elderly multimillionaires in the UK. I don't really think they need a fuel allowance. So to exclude the wealthy from a benefit they don't actually need is pretty sensible.

Exactly this.
I agree with the Winter Fuel Allowance (WFA) ceasing to be paid to the majority of pensioners because of the 11.2m who received it, it's estimated that 8m didn't actually need it (my husband and all our social group included).
Of the remaining 3.2m pensioners, approximately 1.5m are eligible for Pension Credit (PC), yet around 880,000 don't claim it despite DWP drives to raise awareness. It's crucial these people are reached because as well as PC being worth up to £3,300pa, it is also a "passport benefit" to a further £8k pa approx. in other benefits. So, if you or an elderly relative need help checking eligibility for PC, please use one of the many benefit calculators to do so - Entitled To has a good one: www.entitledto.co.uk/benefits-calculator/Intro/Home?cid=5f1b96e8-1c3b-4a8a-b206-08f4e3173d5d (there's also Citizens Advice, AgeUK and Turn2Us, amongst others).
This then leaves 1.7m pensioners whose income isn't low enough to be eligible for PC, but who are only just above the threshold and this is where the line has been drawn in the wrong place. The problem the Govt had was that they couldn't introduce means-testing of the WFA if the administrative cost burden of doing so outweighed the savings - hence the alignment to PC. HOWEVER, Martin Lewis (MoneySavingExpert) has come up with a brilliant suggestion to capture this last low-income group (just above the PC eligibility threshold): extend the WFA to those pensioners living in properties in council tax bands A - D as research has shown that pensioners living in these low CT band properties will likely be the ones living just above the PC threshold, and local authorities already have this information so could introduce a process to pass the information to the appropriate Govt dept each year to ensure it's paid.
Paying the WFA to 8m pensioners who don't need it is a ridiculous waste of money, but targeting it at those pensioners who really need it (without missing any of them out) makes perfect sense to me and if Rachel Reeves listens to Martin Lewis and acts on his suggestion, she will receive a more favourable response to this measure.

Exactly! People were attacking Keir Starmer for being a 'shit leader' when he had only been in power for 2-3 weeks. Like, give the guy a chance you batshit weirdos! 😆

I think no matter who is in power, some people will just whinge if things don't their way. Some people are/have been terribly spoilt and can't STAND it when things don't go the way they want them to! I see a few people on Twitter/X moaning daily about Labour, and berating Keir Starmer. They sound pathetic and unhinged. Ranting and berating Starmer - and personally attacking him. Just because their beloved Tories lost spectacularly! 😆

@poppyzbrite4

I don't think pensioners who are comfortably off, should receive money that could go to the vulnerable. We have millions of people using foodbanks and millions of children living in absolute poverty. The money those pensioners won't miss, should go towards people like them.

Daily Mail translation: you don't like the elderly!

This. Saying that people who agree with the cut, hate the elderly, is a stupid thing to say, and a lazy insult. Grow up FFS!

https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/aug/04/uk-pensioners-left-on-financial-cliff-edge-by-cuts-to-winter-fuel-payments

“A new analysis by Policy in Practice, a social policy software and analytics company, suggests about 130,000 people will miss out on winter fuel payments in the UK because they are up to £500 a year over the threshold for receiving pension credit, making them ineligible for the benefit. Experts warned they may end up worse off than some of those qualifying for the payment.”

This is the problem with the pension credit system. Those with a very small personal pension, who’ve sensibly tried to make provision for their old age, are worse off than those who made no provision whatsoever. Pension credit opens the door to other benefits including help with housing costs, council tax and heating bills. Taking the winter fuel payment away makes this even worse. There are pensioners who would have been financially better off now if they had no personal pension whatsoever.

I agree my MIL is raging all tied in with the migrants. She thinks the benefits system should work like a bank account and you should only get what you paid in- except she’s only worked a couple of years in her life, and there’s no way FIL has earnt enough to be a net contributor for himself let alone her too.

She sitting pretty in her right to buy house brought at a low amount that has risen load - has a holiday home abroad so they aren’t even paying fuel all year. They have aircon in the UK home so obviously aren’t being careful with their energy as though they are struggling.

I do think they should possibly raise the cut off point as it’s possibly too low but yeah I don’t feel sorry for her and have had to block her Facebook so I can’t see the daily moaning

Easy ways to moderate this cut ate to restrict it completely to pensioners who pay 40% tax and also make it taxable for everyone else over the tax threshold.

Actually, you're wrong I'm afraid. According to ONS figures, 79% of people over 65 are home owners.

are you getting right and left wing mixed up? Which papers - the Mail - well they hate everyone don't they. What about in real life? I have seen no uproar have you?

Might be wrong here but the right wing usually go easy on the elderly and cut “hand-outs” and benefits on younger people who should just “get a job”. Pensioners were exempt from the bedroom tax for example.

Not all pensioners own their own homes, so there will be those who pay rent and some of those will be on Housing Benefit and therefore get pension credit automatically now. Otherwise I agree, it has to be cut off somewhere and the current system is not fair.

https://bmmagazine.co.uk/news/four-million-pensioners-face-council-tax-hike-as-single-person-discount-under-threat/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/09/02/angela-rayner-refuses-rule-out-single-tax-discount-cut/

From the House of Lords library.

“The trade union Unite has expressed concern that the policy change would not save any money if all pensioners entitled to pension credit who do not currently claim it took up the benefit:

“The proposed cuts to winter fuel payments will only save about £1.4bn a year. But if all the pensioners who are entitled to pension credit are prompted to apply for it as a result, the total cost of paying out this unclaimed money would cost the government £2.2bn a year—so it might save nothing at all.“”

The Labour government have said that they are cutting the winter fuel payment to save money. It will actually end up costing the taxpayer money if everyone entitled to it claimed pension credit. The government are either economically illiterate, or they are hoping that not everyone entitled to it claims pension credit.

There are many things wrong with the fuel payment as there are with the OP and with the government's way of dealing with it. The well-off class of politicians impoverishing the elderly less well off for a small percentage saving in expenditure while handing out billions elsewhere is not the right thing to do. Those who receive it and don't need it are the problem. They could hand it back if they cared. There are ways of withdrawing it from them without causing misery and hardship to people at the sharp end.

Have you tried living in £215.18 a week, mortgage payments or not?
These pensioners just above getting help (and there’s quite a lot in this situation) will really struggle, yes it needs mean tested but the bar is very low and a lot of pensioners won’t be able to heat their homes adequately this winter.

Whether heard before or not, the thing those who trot this one out forget is that they were never paying for their own future provision, but that of the pensioners who came before them

It's not a popular thing to point out though, as I found too often with my own late mum - and as a stay at home wife she never paid tax but insisted my late father had somehow "paid it for her"

Where are you getting these stats?

Many rent. Many move into HA style homes with government subsidies on the rent but still have rent requirements. Not all homeowners finish their mortgage by age 60/67.

I think many pensioners have come to rely on those payments, regardless of their income and outgoings, and now they're being taken away. It was money they had budgeted for and now it isn't coming.

Surely it's not hard to understand why that would upset someone?

And also, just because this year's energy cap is lower than last year's, doesn't make it cheap. Cheaper maybe, but it's still a massive amount of money.

My inlaws are up in arms about this even though they almost certainly still get it. They also like to share lots of things of FB about how we should be giving money to pensioners and British people in need instead of supporting refugees and asylum seekers. And about how Labour want to take all your tax money that you worked hard to pay and give it to lazy people who don't work.

The irony being that they live in a council house, get pension credit and housing benefit and a free brand new car every 3 years on Motability plus never pay to park due to a blue badge (Step MIL's got COPD and some mobility issues but nothing that really slows her down). And they pay for the most expensive Sky package on their telly. Admittedly they did both work previously, but not always full time and often cash in hand. FIL drank away most of his earnings plus his inheritance (therefore got nothing to pass on to DH). So my sympathy for them and pelike them is limited.

Although there will always be people close to the cut off who suffer with these things, there has to be a cut off somewhere. I still think there were previously a lot of people getting the allowance that didn't need it.

If WFA was reinstated it wouldn't mean all those eligible for pension credit would abandon their claims if they've just realised they're eligible for it, as it is a gateway to other things too.

And if they are eligible, they should be claiming it.

Saying 'axing WFA has cost more money as the poorest pensioners are now applying for a benefit they were always entitled to' is a bad argument.

My sister who lives in the UAE was given it last year. That’s why it shouldn’t be a universal benefit. 🥵

How many of those are unencumbered? I think it's something like 1 in 14 still have mortgage payments.

What a load of piffle.

My late parents used to own their own home - a one-bedroom flat. In 1972, it was bought by the council via compulsory purchase for the equivalent of £5k today. They then rented a two-bed council house. They were in their late 40s and had no hope of being able to pay for another home of their own.

They had a low income, but it was never low enough to allow them to have their rent and council tax paid for them. (Dad's retirement income was so low that he didn't pay tax on it.) Many pensioners today are in the same situation.

Possibly you have spent your entire life in reasonably affluent circles and have no idea of the reality of life for many pensioners.

I think having a higher cut off point would have been better. Old people are vulnerable to cold weather more that those of us who are younger.