Pensioner benefits have been squeezed for years and the assault looks set to intensify as Labour chancellor Rachel Reeves takes money from the older generation and gives it to needy train drivers.
Simon Francis, coordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, has warned that with the energy price cap expected to rise from October 1, pensioners will see their energy bills rise by up to 15% this winter.
Yet Reeves has just withdrawn their Winter Fuel Payment just months before it was due to be paid, costing them £200 or £300 of over 80.
Francis wants Reeves to reverse that with immediate effect. So does former Pensions Minister turned campaigner Ros Altmann, who accuses the chancelor of “balancing the nation’s books on the backs of low income pensioners”.
Altmann called this “this is the wrong political choice”, which it is. Until you remember that most pensioners don’t vote for Labour. Then it looks like the right political choice, if your name is Keir Starmer.
Axing the winter fuel payment could backfire as pensioners freeze at home and fall ill.
“This will increase strains on the NHS, add to pressure on GPs and local councils, ultimately costing taxpayers more,” Altmann said.
Only those who get Pension Credit will get the Winter Fuel Payment, but almost a million of the poorest fail to claim despite being eligible.
Now their lives will get even harder.
Another two million pensioners who are just above the Pension Credit threshold will also struggle.
Altmann said wealthier pensioners can manage without support towards winter fuel bills, but others can’t.
While £200 may be small change for a train driver, but it’s big money for many pensioners.
Successive governments have been chipping away at pensioner entitlements, in what Altmann calls “death by a thousand cuts”.
Before April 2010, women could claim Pension Credit from age 60, but this has increased in line with the women’s state pension age to 66 today.
Meals on wheels has largely ended, while free licences for the over-75s have been restricted to Pension Credit claimants since 2020, hitting three million.
Altmann said there could be more to come. “New rumours suggest free bus passes may be withdrawn for pensioners, too.”
Bus passes are free once people hit state pension age, or from age 60 if they live and travel in London. But for how much longer?
The DWP has mooted lifting the age for free NHS prescriptions from 60 to 66, to bring it in line with the state pension age. The Tories stalled. Reeves may do it.
Pensioners add-ons are administered separately, making them expensive, Altmann said. They’re also tax-free, which adds to the cost.
Where does all this end? In means testing pensioner incomes, most likely.
Reeves’ new tax advisor Sir Edward Troup has already said he would like to see better off “codgers” give up a chunk of their state pension.
But first, Labour will come for their benefits.
