Winter fuel allowance result

Now here’s a problem.
My grandmother came to live with us for the last years of her life, so she freed up her house for a larger family. (That wasn’t why she did it, but by today’s reckoning she did the correct thing and we didn’t get carer’s allowance so we saved the government some money.)
She sold her house and shared the money amongst us. If she had died within the next few years, we’d have been taxed on that money.
If she’d stayed there and the money had been shared after her death, the amount would have been taxed.
I suspect in Mazzie66’s case, the housing offered might not have been where the occupant would have chosen, the money raised would have been heavily taxed or would have quickly vanished if she’d moved to a sheltered facility. E.g. McCarthy homes swallow money like a black hole.
Then she’d have been left with little to provide care funding if she needed to move into a home.
Subsidising single occupancy does sound wrong, but it’s not always as simple as it sounds.

Why should anyone have to manage, then, I suppose?

Rekarie

MissAdventure

People can't expect to live in homes that are far bigger than they need, then expect to be subsidised, though.

Whether they are families, single people, or those on benefits.

It's fine to want to to stay where you have lived, but obviously if it is big, it will cost you more.

Ah yes. Naughty octogenarians who can hardly walk, hear, see.

How dare they want to stay in their home that has had a price rise since they bought it.

Let's get councils to forcibly remove them. That will do it. Might just finish them off so it's a win win.

I can't understand how anyone can think that's OK.

It's disgraceful, Rekarie

We should be evicted, our home given to a deserving family and we should be put in a one bedroomed flat or bungalow.

Oh - except that there isn't anything suitable round here.

I have been trying to declutter again in the vain hope something suitable might turn up, been looking for over 5 years now.

MissAdventure

I can well believe it, and whilst I fully agree with people having choice, I also wonder where that choice ends, when it is ultimately impractical, costly to implement, and paid for, in a roundabout way, by others.

How is my home paid for by others?

There is one thing that I cannot understand. Rachel Reeves has cancelled the WFA for all pensioners not on Pension Credit as she says it will save the government over 1 billion pounds. She wants the 180,000 pensioners that are eligible for Pension Credit to claim it thus enabling them to receive the winter fuel allowance, and other benefits.

Do Reeves and Starmer not realise that if these 180,000 pensioners who are not on pension credit start claiming it and other benefits, it will cost the government a heck of a lot more money than if they gave the pensioners the winter fuel allowance.

I think every single pensioner in the UK should ask Age Uk or other companies like them to help them fill in the forms for income support, can you imagine, 180,000 pensioners claiming it all at once, the mind boggles.

I've no idea.
Perhaps it isn't.

If people can pay their own way, then it's all good.

GrannyGravy13

Spot on!

👏 👏 👏.

My O H has Alzheimers and he's always cold, sits next to the radiator and wears a fleece and gloves,,,while I wear a short sleeved top....that's before the winter starts...so our heating will have to be on too..

MissAdventure

I've no idea.
Perhaps it isn't.

If people can pay their own way, then it's all good.

Apparently not, according to some.

We should move out, let a family have our house, but where we'd move to I have no idea.

I've seen some nice bungalows in country villages but we don't want to move to an isolated village, we like being near amenities so that, if we can't drive, at least we can use a taxi. Can we take our neighbours with us too? The clubs and societies that keep us active? No bungalows have been built here since about the late 1960s.

I know the country is in a dire financial state. But surely the winter fuel payment could have stayed.There are a lot of pensioners who are just above the threshold who would not be eligible for it but with heating prices rising would suffer.This government have inherited a black hole, and should be taxing the oligarchs, and the super rich ,also pursuing the corrupt cronies of Johnson and co who made millions out of Covid.

BigBopper

There is one thing that I cannot understand. Rachel Reeves has cancelled the WFA for all pensioners not on Pension Credit as she says it will save the government over 1 billion pounds. She wants the 180,000 pensioners that are eligible for Pension Credit to claim it thus enabling them to receive the winter fuel allowance, and other benefits.

Do Reeves and Starmer not realise that if these 180,000 pensioners who are not on pension credit start claiming it and other benefits, it will cost the government a heck of a lot more money than if they gave the pensioners the winter fuel allowance.

I think every single pensioner in the UK should ask Age Uk or other companies like them to help them fill in the forms for income support, can you imagine, 180,000 pensioners claiming it all at once, the mind boggles.

More older people may be eligible for Attendance Allowance, too.

I think Rachel hasn't thought that far ahead.

Mollygo

gentleshores

Sorry that link didn't unfurl. Ros Altmann posted today

"Today is the last opportunity for Parliament to protect the poorest pensioners who are at risk this winter. My Fatal Motion in the House of Lords to cancel the Winter Fuel Payments Statutory Instrument will be debated later today."

Starmer won’t give in. He has to project himself as the hard man, and pensioners are an easier target than doctors, train drivers etc. (I’m not saying they don't deserve their pay rises, but look at the actions they can take, against the actions pensioners can take.)

I take your point. Even if the House of Lords motion is passed and it cancels the Winter fuel payment scrapping (HOL can cancel it for up to a year apparently), he will just take something else from pensioners instead.

My brain gets addled easily these days, but during my working life as an Accountant (and still doing a little bit) I took a keen interest in state benefits. For some years I advised (free of charge) single parents on very low incomes, free of charge to them but I was paid a small fee by the local authority. I thought it would make me feel good till I realised that even with all the benefits they still did not have enough to live on!!

Nothing has changed except that is about 45 years ago. Every tweak of the benefits system brings more complications and anomalies, with some people still unable to get enough to live on and others getting benefits they do not need. We hear of evidently-deserving people (often sick and/or disabled) being refused in their claims, and others in seemingly the same situation getting plenty of support they don't all need to the same extent.

I have long advocated (not that anyone listens to me now) they we need a COMPLETE OVERHAUL of all benefit systems, plus taxation, to avoid both unfairness and complexity.

Yes, there will always be some clever-clogs who manage to twist the system but that surely does not affect the vast majority.

It seems very wrong, and saddens me, that after WW2 the majority of us grew up with hope for our futures (and those of our children) in terms of education, equality of opportunity, healthcare, and financial stability - to name but a few elements of society - and it all seems to have gone very sour in the last 20 years.

I recall that in the 70s Ted Heath introduced the pay rise calculation of £1 plus 4%. The fixed amount did at least recognise that everyone's cost of living had increased by at least £x and the percentage added recognised that higher earners probable needed more. Maybe this idea was not so daft. I think the Liberals suggested a similar calculation years later.

Anyway, I just know that the hope we all had that things would improve over the next 50 years has been totally shattered by governments of different persuasion meddling about with seemingly minor changes that have serious impact on some of which the government is either unaware or does not care. I've often asked myself the question "how many ordinary people do MPs actually KNOW?" and I fear the answer is "not very many" - even in the Labour party.

Will it ever change?

Allira

Do Reeves and Starmer not realise that if these 180,000 pensioners who are not on pension credit start claiming it and other benefits, it will cost the government a heck of a lot more money than if they gave the pensioners the winter fuel allowance.

No. I think he’s banking in the fact that most pensioners in need of it will just struggle on, die of cold and take themselves off the electoral register.

Couldn't the help given during those long lockdowns during the pandemic then the Ukraine war have quite a lot to do with this so called ' black hole'?

Mollygo

Allira

Do Reeves and Starmer not realise that if these 180,000 pensioners who are not on pension credit start claiming it and other benefits, it will cost the government a heck of a lot more money than if they gave the pensioners the winter fuel allowance.

No. I think he’s banking in the fact that most pensioners in need of it will just struggle on, die of cold and take themselves off the electoral register.

It was BigBopper who actually said that Mollygo but yes, I think Rachel may have mislaid her calculator.

Miss A: Except that Christianity has been removed from the curriculum!

I thought RE was required to give a balanced view of all religions?

@desdemona. That is EXACTLY what Suella Braverman did last evening. We are governed by pixies and the opposition is non existent.

But something needed to be done. Apparently £237,000,000 was paid last year to ex-pats living in Spain and other warm countries. Maybe this wasn't the fairest way to change the allowance but it was a pretty daft way of setting it in the first place.

I'm one ot those who just miss out on Pension Credit meaning I don't get fuel payments now and have to pay for TV license even though I will have less money than people on pension credit when they get all their benefits

Molly go
I think you may have misread my post. My son only assesses residents living in local authority housing. This particular resident was in receipt of housing benefit and will be having considerable sums of money spent on the house in terms of adaptations when her needs could be met by moving to all one level living in a bungalow, avoiding the additional expense. The question I was posing basically was should single residents be subsidised from the public purse to live in a grossly under occupied property, in this case a four bedroom parlour type house, when families with disabled children are in desperate need of this type of accommodation.

My son does sometimes have to remind residents, diplomatically, that the LA has a statutory duty to meet their needs which does not always align with their wants. Another example would be the elderly lady living alone in a three bedroom house who didn’t like stair lifts and wanted a ground floor extension built with an en-suite bedroom. No, I’m not making this up.

To make it plain, I’m not talking about people living in a privately owned property.

I don't get why MPs don't have to vote l mean isn't that getting paid for nothing Maybe people who have to sign in and out at work could start abstaining and just please themselves

The House of Lords debates from today are on Parliament TV at 7.30pm tonight. So I will be watching to see how Baroness Altmann got on with her motion to annul the Gov decision on winter fuel payments.

I wonder why MPs get paid for fuel expenses in second homes can't that be means tested