Winter Fuel Allowance

Mine was thyroxin too Annobel and I never understood why that was free but my DH's beta blockers were not.

I'm confused. Prescription are free for men and women over the age of 60, irrespective of when they are due to get their pension, 61, 62 etc.

....and, if you live in Wales or Scotland they're free for everyone, anyway aren't they?

People, like Annobel or my DH, who takes a lot of medication could get a season ticket. Current price £104, or £2.00 a week. With the price of prescription season tickets being so low I cannot see why anyone over 18 should get free prescriptions for any reason.

At every other stage in our lives we have constraints on our spending that we have to take into account. In southern England the monthly cost of housing takes a greater proportion of income than in the north, if you live in a rural area it may be necessary to budget for at least one and possibly two cars. Why should we be protected from this just because we have been around a bit longer than other people. Some older people need more medication than others, other older people need to buy in services like gardening or cleaning. It is up to each household to manage their own budget. I find the present system of being given ring-fenced gobbets of money for specific purposes infantilising and demeaning.

Yes, and that's ridiculous, too. It was just a vote-winner in Wales, and of course comes out of the budget, which means other things have to be cut. I'd have thought it more sensible to have a flat charge per prescription (not item) of, say, £3.00, which would still be a lot less than charges in England - and of course those on benefits get prescription medicines free anyway.

(My post was in reply to crimson, of course!)

£104 is actually a lot of money to some people . It would take up a lot of NHS time checking if every over 60 has got a PP and then chasing them for it if they hadn't.

Only about 1 in 10 prescriptions are paid for, what with tax credit exemptions and such like. For some reason I've always been in the 'having to pay' group, so I'm thoroughly enjoying not having to pay [even though I'm only on dry eye drops!].....

I agree with Crimson. £104 is a lot of money to me. I have a condition which requires me to have several items every month. It works out cheaper for me than paying for all the items individually but it's still money I can't afford.

Crimson and Vampirequeen. Sorry I forgot some of us are under 60 years old.

Surely the simplest thing would be to add the WFA into the basic pension and then "reclaim" it via the normal tax system?

If that happened it would, somehow just disappear at some point in the future; people would just start to forget that it was included in the basic pension.

It would be really cheering if a simple system could be organised for paying these benefits to those who need them. Means testing should not be employed as this is going to cost.
I like Elegran's fund idea and also FlicketyB's increase of pension.
The tax office is fully aware of peoples incomes by the tax paid. Perhaps a line could be drawn in a certain place, in excess of which, certain benefits are not paid.
I know that many will not agree with this as they'll say that they have paid in all their life. Remember, there are some pensioners, who have more money than they are able or want to spend. For this reason I am thinking that some of us should show a little compassion for others - if we can afford to.