To say the £35k winter fuel threshold is way too high!

[chocolateismyweakness4]

The threshold needed to be raised, but £35k?! I wish I earned that and I have a mortgage and commuting costs. It also doesn’t take into account savings (so they could have millions in the bank) or household income.

We all know it’s a bribe, but they still won’t get pensioners to vote for them.

Please read up on this as you clearly don't understand how it works at all.

It wasn’t that easy to buy a house in the past. The income ratios were different and you had to negotiate with a bank manager, a real person. Deposits were much higher, many married couples lived with parents for a few years to save up a deposit before banks would even consider lending to them. Council houses were cheap and easy to rent until they were sold off.
Multigenerational houses were common. A lot of my friends had grandparents living with them. And most people didn’t leave home until after marriage.

I was in the first generation of women born mid 60s and onwards who were in a position to buy my own house because of the Sex equality acts. Before that unmarried women didn’t stand a chance on the housing market.

Do you really think there will be the triple lock pension, winter fuel allowance, free bus pass, free prescriptions for pensioners in 20, 30+ years? Well, maybe it will still be there, but the age to qualify will be way into the 70s.

The amount of workers compared to the amount of pensioners is less than it used to be. And the pensioners you were paying for pre-triple lock were receiving a very meagre pension. The workers today have a bigger burden than you did due to more pensioners and the triple lock, which you didn’t have to pay for. The only way round it is to keep increasing the pension qualifying age.

I think it should be based on household income. Any why £35,000? It seems to have been plucked out of thin air!

You could have one person with a minimum state pension receiving it, but living in a household with an ex-banker on a massive pension.

It should also be fully means tested like other benefits - take savings and investments into account.

I'm pleased that my parents will be able to get it again as they're both earning under that and, at 70, are still having to pay rent, etc, having never been able to buy a home of their own.

On the other hand, my FIL is also earning under that in pensions, so will also get it again, but has a fully paid off house and £400k in the bank (i.e. assets worth about £1m), but will now be entitled to it again. He moaned when they took it away, but he didn't change his lifestyle as ultimately he can afford his fuel bills without it.

Was watching a film about the Magdalen laundries in the 70s, with Cillian Murphy. Working class, coal merchant. House, 5 daughters, wife at home. Covered everything with one wage.

Are you suggesting that the government have put my NI payments into a special account in my name ready for me to draw it down when I’m 67?

Hmm, if the threshold of £35k is too high, then why has the threshold for CB been set at £60k?
So in theory a couple could both earn pennies shy of £60k EACH and still qualify for CB?

The agism on this thread is disgusting.

This is the only one under £115k in Lytham St Annes. It’s been on the market for three years, I wonder why?

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/124676645

I'm sure it wasn't easy for all but it is a great deal harder nowadays, impassive for many without parental gifts/inheritance.

In 1991 68% of 25-34 year olds owned a home.

In 2023 around 39% of people aged 25-34 owned their own homes.

Apologies, I was autocorrected! Impossible, not impassive.

Yes childcare is subsidised. But given the huge increases it is still very expensive. Funding childcare has a net positive financial impact due to tax revenues. It also helps to reduce inequality and childhood poverty.
But yes. Remove it immediately 🙄

Yes it does. Pensioners still get help with their rental costs via housing benefit because you become ineligible for UC when you reach pension age. But you are correct in that UC housing element covers rent for those under pension age.
How did you think people on pension credit or even state retirement pension were managing to pay full rent?

I don’t want anyone feeding to death, but people on £35k don’t need hand outs.

No. Although some pensioners appear to think so!

In the child benefit example, you are also supporting a child.

That’s Lytham.

Have you entered St Anne’s on Sea, Lancs? This area only?

There are currently 11 (it’s a small area))

(We know the local market)

You do know that the household income for the WFA is 70k right, for a household with none of the expenses of children and (generally) a mortgage long paid off.

I'm surprised the 2023 figures are as high as that. I believe the stats are that >50% of them had financial help from family in order to buy.

Think you’ll agree, @Blossomtoes, most of those flats are perfectly decent first homes? (The caravan aside 😁)

That might have something to do with the fact that less than 12% of people in that cohort had degrees in 1991. They started work and began saving sooner.

So for a couple earning 35k pension each combined income 70k they get two lots?
It’s unfair as UC is concerned for example it’s based on household income, not per person.

Or indeed downsizes. We’re downsizing to a flat.

The thing that angers me most about this is the way the country has, once again, prioritiesd pensioners. And I'm actually all in favour of universal WFP.
Compare the reaction over taking this away to the reaction when a payment poor kids got for staying in education 16 to 18 was taken away. Money was taken from kids (and only the poorest kids got it) without a single word of complaint from anyone and zero outraged newspaper headlines. Take money away from millionaire pensioners though and all hell breaks loose.