1950s born women to face a quadruple whammy to their hopes over compensation, heating allowances, fuel bills and new taxes
In just 50 days of a new Labour government pensioners rather than the better off have been singled out to pay the price to balance the books of running the country.
They are the people who are often not in the best of health, have worked most of their life and most don’t go around rioting and throwing fireworks or bricks at the police.
So for Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves they are a soft target to save money, particularly if your object is to grow the economy.
To them the elderly are a burden. That is because they would find it difficult to have enough energy to start new businesses, expensive to look after since they are more likely to use the NHS, and the cost of pensions is the real big ticket item for the Department for Work and Pensions costing £125 billion a year – far outstripping any payments to other people. The total DWP annual pay out to people is £258.4 billion – so pensions are almost half the bill. Rachel Reeves will know all about this as her partner, Neil Joicey was finance director at the DWP.
If ministers are prepared to ignore that pensioners feel they have contributed to their pension and it is theirs by right, it would be rather convenient for the Treasury if they died sooner than later. Life expectancy is already stagnant and the new Starmer and Reeves measures could see it fall. Also pensioners were the last group who chose to vote Conservative rather than Labour at the general election, so it would be politically convenient with a five year government guaranteed by its large majority if many had died by 2029. The dead can’t vote.
The justification for means testing the fuel allowance – worth up to £300 per pensioner household – put by Darren Jones, the new Chief secretary to Treasury, was that it was a blanket benefit costing £1.4 billion claimed by the rich and poor. True a 90 year wealthy woman living in Kensington might not miss it, but an average 66 year old man living in Blackpool and about to die a year after getting his pension, will.
But his argument could also be used to abolish the universal state pension- and for all I know is being discussed in the Treasury – since it goes to billionaires -as well as the poorest.
The cut off point to lose the fuel allowance is £218.25 a week for single pensioners and under £332.95 for couples. Some 880,000 earning less than this could apply for pension credit but the forms are daunting for this. I checked to qualify you have to answer up to 243 questions. Read it here.
Some of the questions are bizarre. Why would you have to tell the DWP for example, if you share your home, with another person, whether he or she has ever been in prison or held in custody at a police station? Why do you have to tell them whether they have ever had four weeks holiday outside the UK? If you have over £10,000 in savings you have to fill in an additional 31 questions on another form. You have to disclose all the money send original bank and building society savings books and reveal how much cash you hide at home. You are expected to fill in the form yourself, if you can’t expect a visit from a DWP civil servant demanding why you can’t. No wonder a lot of people are put off and Ed Miliband’s cheery suggestion you apply, appears to mean he hasn’t a clue how detailed the forms are.
The other outrageous thing is that any government proposing a change should do an impact assessment on what this will mean. This was ignored by Rachel Reeves- so keen was she to announce the cuts.
On top of this we now know, after the announcement from the regulator, Ofgem, that energy prices are going up 10 per cent from October adding an average £149 to people’s bills just as the £300 fuel allowance is being abolished. At the same time Labour pointedly did not agree to raising pensioners tax allowances so with the triple lock in place, to avoid the poorest pensioners with little or no extra pension in place starting to pay tax again.
As for the 1950s born women the chance of any compensation – even the paltry sums of between £1000 and £2900 recommended by the Parliamentary Ombudsman — is getting dimmer by the day. A rather frank answer to a constituent from Michael Shanks, the new Labour MP for Rutherglen and junior energy minister, has revealed the Treasury has taken over deciding whether they get a penny.
He wrote:” My understanding is it is being looked at seriously by Treasury and DWP Ministers now they are in post and fresh discussions are taking place about what happens next.
He went on: “You may be disappointed we didn’t simply commit to compensation for all, but as we have discussed before, I think it is more complex than that and I’m not convinced a one size fits all approach is right, or a good use of public money. The PHSO has recommended £1-3,000 per person, costing up to £10bn. However, this would give compensation to women who did know about the change – around 43% of WASPI women according to the PHSO. We need to ensure that any compensation is fair, so that at such a difficult time for the country financially we are not paying out thousands of pounds of compensation to women who were well aware of the changes, and that we are not insulting those badly affected with a mere £1-3,000.”
I have looked at the PHSO report and couldn’t find a reference to this 43 per cent who knew. If this is true it means that over 1.5 million will get nothing even if the government decides some compensation is due.
Meanwhile the campaign by CEDAWinLAW goes on. Jocelynne Scutt, the former Australian judge, who headed an independent tribunal into the fate of 50s women who lost their pensions for six years, was handing in a letter following a petition signed by 37,000 at Number Ten Downing Street today to drive home to Sir Keir the strength of feeling over the discriminatory issue and the need for mediation with ministers. WASPI, which represent 186,000 of the 3.5 million affected say they will have a meeting with minsters next month.
Here’s a newly edited video of the visit by Jocelynne Scutt explaining the latest moves by CEDAWinLAW.
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Another excellent piece David. It is true that there are various levels of income amongst the pensioner population. Would a better approach to the blanket removal of winter fuel allowance have been to make the allowance taxable. By that method pensioners who do not pay tax would have the full £150, pensioners who pay 20% tax would still receive £120 and those high income pensioners who pay tax at 40% would receive just £90.
Rachel Reeves might just have prevented the hoo-ha had she taken such an approach and she should remember that todays workers become tomorrows pensioners and her party will be less likely to retain such a majority if this is how they they plan to govern
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Exactly the point I’ve made time and time again in the Telegraph comments.
Means tests are the work of the Devil and, at whatever level. they create ‘cliff edges’ and ‘poverty traps’.
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when all MPs get £50 a day for breakfast it’s a bit rich to cut a yearly payment for people that have worked and paid all their lives one weeks breakfast for the hypocrites! And handing 11 billion out in overseas aid ! When the people that earned it freeze ! This isn’t labour kier hardy would turn in his grave
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I thought this government and Starmer were going to treat the vulnerable, disabled and our elderly different from the last government. I was wrong. I vote labour and would describe myself as a ‘Brownite’. So here is the outline.
In his professional capacity twenty severn years ago Kier Starmer was engaged behind the scenes in an investigation. That alleged involvement has been a struggle for me to keep quiet about because of my belief in the principal ‘the greatest good for the greatest number’. Well this government has now made my mind up for me.
Come mid-September or by at least October your readers will see two stand alone reports which will be great leads into the Starmer story even though he is not linked to the two. Those reports will set the scene for evidence from people prepared to go on the record to be made public.
I hope by the end of 2024 this revelation and the story associated with it will be out in full.
Labour 2024 you have brought this on yourselves.
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great, sooner the better. This will be the worst government this country has ever known. God help us all
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Has stammer got middle name / Adolf
as he tried to kill us all lnow its stammer
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lets hope this gets published
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David, are you aware there exists also ‘end of life care’ (the cosmetically tweaked, but otherwise unaltered, seamless successor to the outlawed ‘Liverpool Care Pathway’, via which state licensed murder route the elderly (particularly those with dementia) have been being taken permanently off the NHS and state expenditure budgets before their time for years? Have a gander at the FB group ‘FAILED by the NHS – Stop Euthanizing Loved Ones (UK)’. There are other similar groups on line. This was done to my own father, in 2017.
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Thank you David for your continued support, it’s much appreciated 👏 xx
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I said when the fuel allowance was cancelled, that the Labour government were attempting to kill the older people to save money. If that happens, then they should be charged with manslaughter!
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MURDER
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Sadly this is so very true. It’s a pensioner cull by the new Nasty Party, Labour. I never thought I would say that. And I will never vote for Labour again. Jay Harold
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Why! Vote in the first place, was obvious this was going to happen with Labour Party.. 😱
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those if us who have lived through the agony of a labour government knew all this was coming, there must already be millions regretting voting for these cretins
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So who else do you vote for ?
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I did not vote for them because I could see that they were lying and it’s come true .they will bankrupt our country
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I didn’t vote for them either, I bet all that did regret it now, this country is in a big mess since Starmer has been in charge. He needs to go.
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nor me
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Nor me, perhaps if they got rid of the outdated House of Lords, or stopped paying its members £333.00 per day, pensioner’s could still get their heating allowence
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already bankruoted by the sleaze and corrupt party
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I really am disgusted with this they don’t have a clue what it’s like to be old you work hard be respectful and responsible people in the community how dare they want the weakest to suffer they someday will be old but of course they will have plenty of money so don’t care a dot just when you try to believe that a politician actually care once again they don’t care a jot but themselves
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I am afraid every government neglects the old they are not in government when we working hard and paying in with taxes and stamps and more taxes working more overtime they come into government and just see us taking out money for our pension such as it is and think we are burden on public spending not that we paid infor 50 year’s
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Am going to give the 243 questions a go today. Maybe in luck according to Martin Lewis calculator. Have always understood am over the limit , shown in various articles/documents etc. Am 77 years old and disabled. Have contributed when able to work. Wish me luck.
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where does the figure £300 come from my wife and self
Only ever got £ 100 each.?
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I probably should have said up to £300. It is payable per household and over 80s get £300. So your £100 each would be £200 split between you. I will amend it in the blog.
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David I have this morning done the Questionnaire for Pension Credit! Phew. I did Martin Lewis calculator and think it worth a go. Have always in past thought I would not be eligible. They will be inn touch by 8th october! Fingers crossed. Ann Townson
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you are spot on my wife and I did only get £200
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our voting system needs changing this 1st past the post needsto go, replaced with a PR SYSTEM based % received by the parties n they share the cabinet seets n dept
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Obviously most labor cabinet members don’t have elderly parents.
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they possibly do, but can afford to not worry about the odd few hundred here or there.
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we now have a government who is actively attacking pensioners, a soft target and yes the rich can afford to lose the benefits that are bein withdrawn but most pensioners do not have that income. And it now looks like putting money into a company pension scheme is a waste of time as the loses incurred by pension schemes due to covid and various conflicts have left many pension pots with losses they will never recover from. So money you thought you would have no longer exists and you get to pay tax on it, also disqualifies you from any benefits. But we can afford to pay even more benefits to those already claiming benefits but who do you think has paid for these benefits, the pensioners and the workers who pay tax and national insurance every month not those on benefits who are now often better off than the employed. Welcome to five years of a government who want to kill of the elderly.
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The financial attack on pensioners by Rachel Reeves was very nasty she obviously didn’t do her sums to come to the decision when you see pensioners cost 125 billion pounds who have contributed to the economy in taxes ect to the people on universal credit most never contributing into the system with free council tax some living rent free free buss passes and now a fuel payment with 133 billion pounds annual payment so who is better off when you tally all the freebies why work why vote as however gets into power they get their benefits so who is better off. Can someone please explain this to me.
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You work out of respect for yourself.
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this is just the start next will be the pensioners national insurance introduction of water meters to all house holds increase in all health insurance identity cards the list goes on taxes will go up for everybody you have seen nothing yet look out there’s a reckoning to come.
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Identity cards?…..what about the smart phone many people are “welded to” these days….your virtual life story is encapsulated in them….no need for ID cards!
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Of course they want pensioners to die. They don’t care. We pensioners are a burden to them and it doesn’t matter that we’ve paid into the system all our lives. But instead of targeting all the worthless projects they decided it was easier to go for the weakest.
As a pensioner I am 69 and having to retire shortly because of arthritis in my fingers. I will only have state pension which is just over the limit for pension credit. I have also had pneumonia twice and will suffer greatly in the winter months from the cold unless it kills me which thanks to labour will likely happen. The NHS can’t cope now never mind when millions more pensioners end up in hospital but the Government doesn’t care about that either as there will be blanket DNRs in place for when the elderly are admitted to hospital.
who will be responsible for all the burst pipes in poorly constructed social housing because pensioners can’t afford to put the heating on. I live in a social housing flat which goes over an access to a car park round the back which means there is nothing beneath me. I have already suffered greatly every winter because the cold comes up through the floor which besides carpets and layers of rugs is painfully cold.
this government is guilty of discrimination and will be guilty of mass genocide
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If they want to kill pensioners off they will have a way to go to beat Boris and Hancock’s success by returning old people to care homes when they had COVID without allowing them to be tested first. Must try harder! I shall be 80 in a few weeks.
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Wait till this winter when the flu and COVID returns
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I agree. My husband is 85, he had a stroke 6 or so years ago. He has the higher level of attendance allowance, he has a small pension from his old employer, which with my NHS pension just puts us over the top for pension credit and therefore winter fuel help. My husband can barely stand, and has pressure sores. I am his full time carer. He sits in his chair most of the day so gets very cold, we have multiple equipment that uses electricity. How am I supposed to care for him properly, it would break his heart if he had to go into a care home just to keep warm and have care. I couldn’t afford for him to go down the private route. How much is it going to cost the government to build new care homes , there aren’t enough places now, and train the staff.
discrimination, yes, anger, worry . And I certainly didn’t vote for them.
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I know what you are going through I have a wife that needs care not as bad as your husband but it is disgusting what happened to the care from the cradle to the grave motto
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what ive suspected for years, now I can see it’s a fact .
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Nowonder people aren’t claiming Pension Credit I’ve just had a look at the form you need to complete and to say it’s confusing is an understatement. So the government pick an easy target shame on them.
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if the country is in such a dire state and the government is cutting back on everything are they going to cut expenses that MP’s claim, two of them claiming private school fees for the same child, or the duck house, I bet that will stay the same,
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they should pay the loans back that they had for their 2nd homes, I’d let them keep the profit but what was paid pay it back, n why do they get a pension for life even if they have only served 1 5 Yr period
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no one has ever explained why when the new old pension scheme was set up it was paid at a higher level than that paid to the existing pensioners. Thus we already have a 2 tier pension system- the really old get less than the newly old and each year the triple lock increases that divide. Presumably the thinking is that the quicker the really old die the greater the chances on cashing in on their savings!
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not many people realise about our two tier system they just push the new state pension, which incidentally happens to be the worst in the developed world
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Probably we have a two tier pension because those people on the new pension have paid in 6 more years in tax and insurance, I dont know but that could be the reason.
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Euthanasia by the back door! I asked my prospective Labour candidate why there was nothing about retired people in the manifesto – now we know why. Next, perhaps charging for prescriptions, seeing as those ‘pesky pensioners’ require more medications than “hard working families”. That, plus not being abke to heat their homes adequately (as opposed to wirking in a cosy office all day) should see a few of them off. Also, remember, WASPI women who stayed at home to raise their children were not allowed to pay into work or private pensions until Hariet Harman changed the law in 1998, and so don’t have vast pensions.
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but they happily spend £8000,000 a day and rising on illegal immigrants,if you wanted to save money surely that’s the way to go,not a mention of that.
one way to look at it though,quite a few political commentators believe labour won’t last five years,they are even worse than the Tories,which means that it’s highly unlikely they or the Tories will see the inside of number 10 for several decades if ever again.so we bite the bullet and let them self harm for the next couple of years and we will never hear from them again.
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Don’t you believe it.Uncle Starmer is letting in illegal immigrants who will eventually get British citizenship and be allowed to vote.Whoopee,good old Uncle Starmer. I am 88 but am not giving in,will be down to the charity shop to find some jumpers,trousers and socks and then off to buy a tin of soup and out of date bread. I started little jobs when I was 13 and worked til I was 60.Saved very hard so have a bit behind me,still scrimping and scraping but no benefits. Will try and leave a few pounds to my kids if Aunty Rachel doesn’t get her fingers on it. Have never voted Labour,saw this coming.
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why would anyone work, pay into a private pension, buy a house or save money for a relatively comfortable old age. If you do none of these things the government pay for everything . I own a small house in outer London ,have two private pensions neither of which pay much and savings, again not considerable. We sacrificed much to buy the house, not having holidays, my children going without etc…..and now, because we made that sacrifice, if I need residential care my house will be taken to pay for it as the Labour government have removed the cap on care costs and the person in the next bed pays nothing if they are on PC. and if I manage to die without needing care a big chunk will disappear in IHT as the threshold has not been raised in line with inflation for many years. WHY WOULD ANYONE WORK, CONTRIBUTE TO THE ECONOMIC WEALTH OF THE COUNTRY WHEN YOU CAN LIVE ON BENEFITS.
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You have the intense satisfaction to know that everything you have was due to your hard work and not the State.,
It doesn’t matter about taxes when you depart if you have no family
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It’s all part and parcel of the WEF ideal, Starmer is a fully paid up member.
Also very Marxist, no body owns anything, except the elites, and multi millionaires such as Starmer, who also draws a tax free pension.
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But David, pensioners are the better off. This is a rather silly piece.
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And yours is a rather silly comment,all pensioners are well off are they?
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What a huge generalisation. Total rubbish.
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who is this economic illiterate? Adviser to Truss?
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I’m horrified by this winter fuel payment being stopped for pensioners not on pension credit, my dad will be 91 in September and literally just scrapes through missing out on pension credit, he barely has any money spare. I think the government should be ashamed of what they are doing to these people.My dad served in the war and worked his whole life without any breaks in employment, he has never asked for anything, my dad struggles with paying heating and food with the winter fuel payment goodness knows how he will cope this winter. If my dad dies this winter through lack of food or warmth I will hold the government completely responsible
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it is simple, somebody. has to pay for all the Munitions going Ukraine and the Shysters who are running it.
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off topic and a drop in the ocean, Comrade
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Has Rachael Reeves got elderly parents or is her fat pay packet keeping them .I don’t know how she can sleep at night there were other things that could have been looked into before the fuel payment .It was all lies when they were campaigning before the election and they are blaming the previous government to cover up the lies they’ve told shame on you .
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i canot understand how these Labour MPs live
with themselves its all about taking money from the very people who have worked hard all their lives and provided for their family. We are in for a very rough five yrs
where are the Good Leaders when we need them please start action before they
ruin our country
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Starmer and Reeves will both have blood on their hands after this winter.
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Great article. I am a 1950s born woman, have worked since I was 15, full time for most of it, brought up two children on my own after suffering violence at the hands of my ex husband. I cared for both parents at home until death whilst still working. I still work and pay tax on combined state pension and earnings. I cannot afford to stop work. Never had a holiday until last year in a friend’s house, never stayed in a hotel and don’t eat out. I think that pensioners could reduce hours for companies to bring in youngsters for the pensioners to teach them their jobs, that way the youth would acquire self worth, plus money they earnt would boost the economy, and the pensioners would have more free time again to spend and help the economy instead of just sitting around waiting to die.
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The system needs to be changed so that the public can demand a general election after say 12 months if they are not happy with the way the government is running the country. If they think they may only serve 12 months they may not rush into stupid decisions and think properly into what they are doing and do things that actually help the people that put them in power.
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pick on the pensioners they cannot go on strike.
worked all our lives to get trod on
would be a better idea to stop the immigration of people into the country
claiming benefits being put on to our NHS
without paying any contributions we are a small island send them elsewhere they must be costing millions every week
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Hi Raymond. Not quite true. Difference between permitted immigration and the boat people. My son in law who is an Iraqi Kurd has come over here on a spouse’s visa. To use the NHS he has had to pay around £2500 to access it. He is not claiming any benefits but has got work. He won’t get the NHS free until he has been here for five years and can apply to be a British citizen.
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if Rachel Reeves and Kier Starmer believe the elderly are a burden, i feel sorry for their parents I hope they aren’t a burden!!!! They should remember they will be elderly one day. Ah I forgot they will have money not to have to worry about it. Also have they forgotten it is the elderly who have worked all their lives which have contributed to make the place a better place.
I for one have worked all my life and built up a pension pot so that I can live a comfortable one Nothing excessive and below a 40%tax threshold. Hopefully I will not be some a burden to the state or family.
I too am a Waspi who should have retired at 60 but continued working until 65.5 years. So I am lucky but I would have like to have retired at 60.
Labour have always in the past been a government which has caused a bigger financial burden. I don’t see any different happening. The conservatives had their issues and some their own doing but they did have to deal with a pandemic which was a big financial burden which was never going to disappear quickly then on top an economic crisis which I also believe was partly due to the pandemic. Hopefully we have learnt from this for the future as the government helped people out with Furlough and self employed grants.
It’s going to be Interesting to see how everything progresses.
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So it’s “one size fits all” when applied to the removal of the winter fuel allowance with no sliding scale for the people who just miss out on pension credit by a few pounds, but when it comes to Waspie compensation it will be carefully targeted!
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The 50s ladies have been hit by a triple whammy 1 We had to wait 6 years to get our pension, 2 we have lost the winter fuel payment and 3 we have to wait until our 70th birthday to get the shingles jab.
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men have always had a 5 year disadvantage
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this
government should take a good hard look t themselves and be disgusted as we are
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it’s a disgrace that people who have paid into the system all their lives are now penalised by that same system ,but what gets under my skin the most is the arrogance that Rachel Reeves delivered her announcement about the winter fuel allowance ,she has a cocky ,superior air about her ,that she knows best and what she says goes ,and sod the rest of you!!!
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while many pensioners may die before the next election Labour fails to realise those pensioners have children and grandchildren,people have good memories.
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Labour should be ashamed of themselves taking away winter fuel allowance, always hitting the poor pensioner. I have always voted Labour since I left school.when I was 15 years old. I’m ashamed.of starmer. Hit the rich properly not the pensioners.
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I agree with you Sue
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i live in a park home and I am seventy seven years old and these places are very very cold in the winter so I am on my own and I am not going to be able to have my central heating on because I can not afford it it is disgusting what she is doing to the old people that is all she is picking on and I hope one day she gets what she deserves for doing what she has done there will be a lot of pensioners die because of her answer especially people who live in park home s
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We all know they just want as many pensioners as possible to die….they totally ignore the fact we have worked hard all our lives to enjoy our retirement and now its not to be. They will keep.on sending huge amounts of cash to other Countries, housing illegal immigrants by the thousands.and lining their own pockets whenever possible. THANK YOU LABOUR GOVERNMENT, SEE HOW MANY PENSIONERS DIE THIS WINTER AND THEN YOU CAN MASSAGE THE FIGURES AND SAY ITS LESS THAN A NORMAL WINTER. Thats before any other cuts you will make to our Pensioners. YOU SHOULD FEEL TOTALLY ASHAMED !!!! I BET YOUR ELDERLY PARENTS AND FAMILIES WILL BE PROTECTED !!!!!
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hit the pensioners can’t fight back why don’t they take a drop in their salary and expenses
well done labour look after the public sector but forget all the people who paid your wages and national insurance and tax
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it’s not new labour and pensions I haven’t forgot Gordon Brown dipping into our pensions
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What an odd article. Pensioners as a group is the richest age group in UK only behind 55-65 year olds which are approaching the pension age and still working. Your typical pensioner is about 5 times wealthier than someone in 30s who is actually working. The real madness is how long this unfair system with triple locks have been taking money from the economically active working people, most of them sharing living space or cramped in small flats or rented houses and giving money to pensioners who enjoy living in their large houses complaining about bills while hardly visiting all the rooms in the house! About time to end this madness or more and more young people will give up and say – why do I struggle making ends meet – might as well do nothing and go on benefits!
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do you think that pensioners didn’t suffer hardships when they were younger? Pension is not a credit, it’s a right which has been earned by hard work and paying taxes during a period that was far more economically challenging than todays so-called cost of living crisis.
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What a load of rubbish. What planet are you living on I worked since aged 15 paid into the system to get a pension of £11,500 a year I’m seventy one and still work and pay taxes .i worked so that one day when I’m too old to work I can retire and live out my last days in comfort which by the way I worked for ..don’t you think that I was 27 once and lived in a shared house scrimped and saved to buy my own place .. paid my taxes, insurance ,mortgage , rates , the upkeep of my house , brought up children, without handouts from this country never been unemployed and didn’t get much maternity benefit or child benefits and certainly no year off after birth for either myself or my husband. we are still both working .The elderly made this country what it is today. If you want to complain about something have a go at the illegal immigrants living in hotels that don’t pay rent, don’t have to switch off their heating, don’t have to feed themselves who get pocket money don’t work so don’t contribute to the system like the majority of free loaders that people like me have paid for .. you forget you will be old one day.
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thanks for the article, grim reading indeed. If there is a £20billion black hole in the public finances, surely the shadow government during covid would have been made aware that the borrowing that took place to support so many people ,they would know the content?? Selective amnesia?? Very convenient!!
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why don’t you people stop giving freebies/handouts to the unemployed. Most of these people get money from the government FOR DOING NOTHING and have no intention of looking for work.
think about going back the old system where they had to prove they were job hunting or cut their benefits.
How many older people must die this winter from the cold.
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This is a personal comment it will apply to thousands of pensioners like me.
During Gordon Brown’s chancellorship in New Labour’s government, the rules relating to financial activities were relaxed. In 2008/9 the financial system collapsed.
I saved together with employer contributions into a private pension fund. This lost 64% of its value overnight. I managed to make up some of the losses but George Osborne’s program of austerity and low interest rates prevented buying an annuity at the level previously forecast
My private pension is over 25% less than planned.
What did I do wrong?
managing my life is now like a full time job.
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so it’s OK to attack OAPs confuse them freeze them or starve them but even better to meet and greet illegal immigrants place in warm accommodation feed them and build them a house what’s going on mr primister can’t wait for next general election your not going to win stop blaming last government for everything put your hand up admit you always had most of this ready to implant.
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A Labour government they should hang there heads in shame i am 66 years old never been out of work i recieved my pension at 66, 12 months late my wife who should have had hers at 60 will now have to wait untill she is 67. I have allways voted Labour but i assure you never again. This Labour government will be short lived
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Voted Labour? Should have gone to specsavers.
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most won’t now admit it
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Pensioners currently support 1000’s of small businesses throughout the country, When Starmers plan bites in the dead of winter pensioners will not be able to afford a tea or coffee a sandwich, an occasional lunch, a cheering up hair do, car insurance, petrol/holidays and a miriad of other nice to have things.
This will have a huge impact on small businesses lot of which will probably go out of business throwing maybe thousands more into the unemployment pile and thereby showing the UK how little labour actually knows about growing an economy.
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This government will be so bad for this country. Open book for migrants. May add who paying for them. People paid into system all there lives get nothing this government for people working classes they only believe to decide attack most vulnerable. Ask Starmer before he got into power he moved all his pension fund so he would not be affected all two faced. Now let’s look at Angela Rainer charging round in hard hat a joke in top of her hard hat she has air same what’s in her head nothing just as same rest labour party. Let’s look at working man Starmer wants us to pay per mile so now to go to work the blokes a joke all labour politicians are millionaires you voted for them not me congratulations.
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Overall – complete right wing guff.
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Since the DWP acquired powers to look at individuals bank accounts, surely they could see which pensioners are wealthy and do not need the extra support, rather than stealing from the poor how about cutting support for the rich and giving to the poor!
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i have never read so much bs in all my life. The hypocrisy of the Tories is unbelievable, one of their last acts in government was tax rises. Fourteen years of shite and they a slagging the Labour government. With regards to the Winter Fuel Allowance, scrap it all and put the responsibility on the energy companies. No bills for pensioners in the winter months.
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what utter drivel
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“……and I’m not convinced a one size fits all approach is right, or a good use of public money.”
But sending billions of £’s to other countries is fine??????
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Another deflection piece obfuscating that years of neglecting the NHS and social care is driving older people to their grave. Just focusing on the state pension is disingenuous but what we’ve come to expect from the extreme right wing Nasty Party and their apologists as they desperately try to remain relevant.
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The NHS gets too much money. — it’s just run and managed poorly by a bunch of numpties handing over disgusting amounts of money to people who don’t actually deliver and overpay heavily for supplies because the people in charge are spending taxpayers money and aren’t responsible with it. If it was a business they’d be fired and the business would likely collapse but all the little chiefs know that’s not going to happen so they carry on overspending and wasting money!
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I take it you don’t work in the NHS and got plenty of money to go private,and I assume you have not got a clue what you are talking about.Have a look at other business that waste vasts amount money ,governments,Councils etc etc.
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nothing changes the rich get richer those pensioner’s who paid all their lives get poorer, STOP lunch allowance for MPs and give to those who need it make me sick that those with money get same allowance, also those in care homes albeit NHS or private where still getting fuel allowance both governments are screwed up and useless sit down do the sums building is beyond belief and nine times out of ten the homes go to those just arrived in this country. I went to my doctors yesterday a lady who has a temp doctors pass was trying to get the doctors to put her through for cataract surgery and extended her temp doctors surgery for three months this needs to stop
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easy target are pensioners but then millionaires are not we spend billions on illegal immigrants that come for a better life but neglect the people who worked hard and paid taxes to keep this country running two tier starmer you are a judas that’s why I didn’t vote for you another pm out of touch with the common people
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so true , I have worked 53 years payed my tax , stamp and what do I get when labour and this silly bitch comes into power Nothing but a kick in the teeth. It’s these asylum seekers they need to stop looking after and look after those that have kept this country going , she’s a big Bitch couldn’t give a shit about us
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shameful, targeting the pensioners !
Shame on you Labour government
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Well that article isn’t in the least biased is it ? Cough cough cough !!!
Oh And I am a middle class pensioner by the way. I didn’t and never would or will vote Tory !!
Bill
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I have never voted tory in my life but looking at two tier starmer put me off labour he has more faces than the town hall clock and I was right sitting down with pensioners and pretending to listen indeed
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disgraceful disgusting disregard for the elderly over the removal at short notice to pensioners who are the group in most need over the winter period most are on low fixed income and the most vulnerable during the levels of severe winters going forward utter disgusting from a government supposedly looking after the people they represent to Syphon benefits from the elderly to pay for salary’s that these groups have held the country to ransom no respect goes to this so called government total disgrace
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have looked at all the comments and listened to keir starmer just like all the politicians never trust anything as other’s have said worked all my life but once again the poor always get the trod on maybe the government will pay for all the early deaths to get buried
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I am a pensioner, I’m also a WASPI. I am in poor health, I need glasses and I have a broken upper denture and a little collection of rotting teeth on the lower jaw. I’m on new pension, so I get nothing. I just about manage to get by from week to week. I have arthritis, anxiety, depression, panic attacks and agoraphobia. I haven’t been outside of the house for three years. I have no savings. I live in a hard to let area, because it’s cheap, but housing benefit is capped, so I get less than half my rent and have to make it up out of it pension. I have to pay fuel, water rates, council tax, tv licence, mobile phone, I’m on the cheapest pay and go tarrif I could find. I don’t have broadband, I can’t afford it. My mobile phone is old and doesn’t work too well. I get a bit of data allowance so I use that. I have to do my shopping once a week and have it delivered. I live on cheap bread and pasta and anything I can find that’s reduced. I need to lose weight, but I can’t afford to eat healthy. I don’t smoke or drink ever. Last winter, I could just about afford to keep one room warm. I slept on the sofa. Now, I find I’m getting no help at all with winter fuel, and the cost is rising again. I don’t know how or if I can afford any heating this winter. I don’t know if I will survive. I am not alone, there are thousands of us, the very lowest level of society, we are old, we don’t matter, it’s best if we are all dead, so they’re doing their best to kill us off. Life in UK amounts to working all your life, usually in low paid jobs, but paying taxes etc, we paid into the system all our lives, we get old, we used to retire, freeing up jobs for young people, but now, many pensioners have no choice but to keep on working, they have no choice. We get nothing, because our pension is around £2 over the threshold for pension credits. They are pushing pensions to apply for pension credits, when they know that us on new pension don’t qualify. I hope they are going to plough a huge sum of money into the NHS, because this winter, the hospitals will be full to the max with old people, too ill to go home, because they have no money for heating, their homes are cold and with no heating, they become damp. Hundreds will no doubt be found dead in their homes, dead of hypothermia. This isn’t humanitarian, this isn’t caring, this is mass murder.
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Hi Roma, your post encapsulates exactly why I felt moved to write the blog. Age Concern estimates that there may be as many as two million pensioners in your position just above the threshold for help. and now heading for a miserable winter because of this callous decision. To my mind it shows how out of touch the new Labour leadership is with ordinary people an d how little they care about the plight of pensioners.
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The sheer hypocrisy! They won’t let intelligent, terminally-ill people who are facing an appalling death decide to end they lives in a decent way and time of their own chosing on moral grounds. The morality is: the government feels it’s their right to finish off pensioners who are no longer contributing vast sums to the tax gatherers! Janet Street-Porter asked Rishi Sumak to his face ‘Why do you hate pensioners?’ and the triple lock was rapidly confirmed; perhaps she should do the same to Kier Starmer or has he no shame? The fact that Pensioners are identified as easy targets is demonstrated in the fact that they openly announce that nearly a million are entitiled to Pension Credit but don’t claim. Instead of penalising them for their independence, write and tell them it is their ENTITLEMENT for all the years they worked hard and did contribute directly to the Exchequer (even thoughmany pensioners still do pay tax!). Moreover, it’s about time the government recognised their current contribution: Childminders, Carers, Charity Workers, Volunteers; when you have killed them off prematurely, through Hunger and Freezing, just how will you pay for the billions in services they currently save the country?
I say ‘them’ – if the government had not breached the contract they made with me and ‘stolen’ my pension for 6 years, I would now be one of them. If you are short of money to this degree, how about raiding the MP’s pensions and those of the greedy managers and share holders of failing companies like the Water and Utility mob?
When you have to attack your old people, the country is terminally broken.
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They will be bringing back euthanasia next !!
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BLOODY DISGUSTING, SHAME ON STARMER, HIS CRONIES AND EVERYONE WHO VOTED FOR LABOUR
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I’m so glad I didn’t vote Labour, it won’t stop Starmer creating his Police State, but I’ll die early with a clear conscious!
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😥 sadly the dishonesty of Labour’s election campaign promises are only to be expected. It’s forgotten that, like me, many worked their whole working life without burdening the state and planned for our future which didn’t rely on state handouts.
So no suprise raids on our responsible forward planning is the soft belly for socialist raids.
Payoffs to trade unions and their cronies has always been there mantra.
So back to first principles the public have been drawn in to the lies. But we deserve the government we voted for. 🗳
time to pay the price.
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No doubt hoping the pensioners will die of hyperthermia then they can save even more. Do we hear any talk of politicians taking a pay cut?
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I would like to know why do all PMs past and present get their salary for life?
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I have responded to Age UK and have written to my MP who is Tory and thus in the minority. What you have just said I have already stated to them that it is a culling of the elderly who are no longer fit to contribute to society and are a drain on the NHS. This, as people are throwing this word around at the moment, is genocide. Starmer only stepped at the Liverpool riots with a strong line because he knows that Muslim people support Labour and give their votes to them yet nothing was done about the hatred towards the Jewish people over the war in Gaza. Do not get me wrong I am against the violence they displayed and I do not wish anyone to be harmed but peaceful protests are needed to stop this destardly gesture by this government. Yet they will give raises to civil servants and those in the public sector, while trying to persuade us that people work more productively at home for 4 days a week. We should embrace illegal immigrants because they can work for lower wages. I do think that any allowance should be means tested but there are at least 2 million who will fall into the gap. I feel that Age UK should appeal to the Court of Human Rights as everyone else does. I am appalled by this as for many pensioners it is not just an injustice but a death sentence.
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Pension Credit qualifies for Warm Home Discount (£150) , AND Winter Fuel payment( £100/£200/300)! Neither of which is available to State Pension or PIP recipients. People who failed to acquire 35 years NI get more support than full time workers do!
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pensioners have been given no time to prepare and save up for the removal of the winter fuel allowance . .
a challenge would likely win on the same basis as WASPI but same as WASPI will never be paid .
I agree with many observers that big swing elections and one term governments will be the norm but after five years of this Labour cabinet irreparable damage will be done .
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The claim about 43% of women knowing is in paragraph 99 of the report – says it was from DWP research done in 2003/24: But only 43% of all women affected by the changes knew their State Pension age was 65, or between 60 and 65 years.
https://www.ombudsman.org.uk/sites/default/files/Women%E2%80%99s_State_Pension_age_-_our_findings_on_the_Department_for_Work_and_Pensions_communication_of_changes_Final.pdf
But that number is meaningless unless we are told what, how and where this research took place and how many women were questioned. It could have been 100 women in one workplace, an employer who happened to have displayed leaflets and 43 women had read one.
I was widowed in 2007 age 51. My husband was 55 and had paid 40 years of NIC. Widows Pension had been abolished in 2001. I went in person to JobCentrePlus to get a form to claim Bereavement Allowance which is paid for 52 weeks.
The correspondence I have is from The Pension Service – letterhead described as part of the Department for Work and Pensions with an address JobCentrePlus, Bury St Edmunds. I still have a copy of the form I was given to complete. It is print dated 18 March 2007. It states:
You can usually get Bereavement Allowance for 52 weeks You can become entitled to State Pension when you are 60 for women, 65 for men.
There are other references in the 28 page document to women receiving benefits at 60 and men at 65.
In 2007, twelve years after the Pensions Act 1995, The Pension Service/DWP/JobCentrePlus were giving out forms to women born in the 1950s telling them they would get their pension at 60.
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Joy thank so much for this. So it comes from the DWP not from a survey by the PHSO. Like you I am sceptical as it smacks of the DWP marking its own homework. It is also misleading to say it comes from the Ombudsman when it is quoting the DWP.
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Frim Christine Brooks
If I may add something else. This is a side issue but is relevant in the context of how younger pensioners are badly treated by pension legislation. I am not sure how many people are aware of this. I only became aware after having a nagging feeling that my pension should be higher and pressing the DWP to provide a breakdown – which has only very recently revealed the reason why.
If your spouse (or civil partner) was born after 5 October 1945 and you were born after 5 July 1950, if you are widowed, you can inherit 50% of the additional State Pension (aSP) your spouse earned through paying SERPS etc. This percentage was higher for older pensioners.
But this does not apply if you were widowed young and claimed Bereavement Allowance. Inherited aSP is reduced by 7% for every year you were younger than 55 when widowed.
But the Bereavement Allowance does not included aSP and is only paid for 52 weeks anyway. There is no help after that.
I did not receive my State Pension until I was 66 but the 50% inherited aSP element has been reduced by 28% because I was only 51 when I was widowed. Someone widowed at age 45 will have their 50% spouse’s aSP reduced by 70%.
This is pension our late spouses paid for through their NIC. It just goes into a pot and sits there until the widow(er) reaches state pension age. What logic is there for reducing it?
Had our spouses lived to pension age and claimed their aSP they would have received 100%. Had they died after state pension age, the widow(er) would then have inherited 50% so why are young widow(er)s penalised for the rest of their lives for having been widowed young? It is unfair and makes no sense.
There was nothing on the form I completed in 2007 to claim Bereavement Allowance that warned that State Pension would be affected … but then that form also told me I would get my State Pension at 60.
This adjustment currently reduces my pension by £24 a week and that reduction increases each year. Coincidentally, my current energy direct debit is £95 a month. That lost pension would pay my energy bill.
If I live to 90, I will have had my pension reduced by another £40,000 on top of the £40,000 pension lost through equalisation. I feel well and truly robbed by equalisation, robbed again by losing pension that my dear husband worked and paid for and now robbed again by losing the WFP that I had to wait an additional six years to receive in the first place.
I was thinking there can’t be that many people in the same boat but then I looked at some ONS statistics. In 2007, there were around 130,000 people between the ages of 45 and 54 who were also widowed, people who would have reached SP age a couple of years before me or are coming up to SP age by 2028. They may be thinking they are going to inherit more aSP than they will, unaware of this unfair reduction that will be applied.
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There has always been something infinitely worse than the Tories, it is the pretend pseudo socialists, the Peter Mandelson socialists. This Labour government is full of them, individuals who chose the career path of politics and the Labour Party. But do not breath the fire of socialism. Keir Starmer, anaemic and limp wristed with as much charisma as a turnip. Establishment through and through, and appears as though he is about to burst out crying at any moment I have never taken to the man – it is not in my nature to be personal but I so dislike Starmer. Rachel Reeves, could be Starmer’s twin sister, she has similar non-attributes. I dislike the woman intensely. End of ad-Hominems.
There have been so many missteps by this government, withdrawing winter fuel allowance is but one, I can see them not even making it to the next election.
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I didn’t vote for them as their Manifesto was a smoke Screen of things to come. Can’t understand why alit of people didn’t realise this. Now it’s too late 🤬🤬🤬🤬
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I’ve posted this on X and repeating it here. The 43% comes from a 2004 DWP report:
Click to access rrep221.pdf
This was a survey done over November 2003 to February 2004 of just under 2700 working age “adults” between the ages of 16 and 65, both female and male, asking them about their awareness of State Pension age equalisation.
Of women who would be affected by the changes, the sample was only 1,039 women. These were put into three categories:
Managerial and professional occupations:
398 women were questioned. 46% or 183 were aware of their new pension age.
Intermediate occupations:
242 women were questioned. 51% or 123 were aware of their new pension age.
Routine and manual occupations:
399 women were questioned. 152 of 38% were aware of their new pension age.
Weighted average gives 43% which is 183+123+152 = 458 women.
That is a small sample, about the number of people that would fill a small church of lecture theatre.
Michael Shanks appears to picking up on the summary in the PHSO report …
97. DWP research in 2003/2004 looked specifically at public awareness of State Pension age equalisation, and was reported in October 2004. 62% of working age women knew State Pension age was going to rise. This increased to 73% amongst all respondents aged 45 to 54 (women born in the 1950s would have been aged 45 to 54 in 2004). But only 43% of all women affected by the changes knew their State Pension age was 65, or between 60 and 65 years.
.. but without reference to how the number was arrived at.
To extrapolate 458 to deny maybe 1.5 million women compensation would be ludicrously unjust.
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Rachael THIEVES
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whot a government another torys in red ties but sadly I had lost my wife only for the DWP to tell me after her death I was getting the right monies anyways how nice of them even at the start of letter how sincere they were but jump six months or so and a lady from old age charity phoned me asked how much I was having whot benefits I told her only pension she informed me that I was fifty four pounds under I told her that couldn’t be right has DWP told me I wasn’t entitled to more how quaint are those in power to allow such actions by their employees we allowed the crooks into power
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