Rachel Reeves has announced that winter fuel payments will only be paid to those on Pension Credit.nsion Credit

Casdon sorry to be dim but I don’t understand your message quoting me?

And before I toddleoff to make the gravy, let’s remember - didn't turn to Labour, they turned away from the Conservatives.

Urmstongran

Even Diane Abbott accuses Rachel Reeves of ‘renewed austerity’ today. The Veteran Left-wing MP takes aim at Chancellor’s spending cuts and warns of ‘more to come’!

Best hold onto our hats.

Himself just said “no wonder their manifesto was so ‘lite’ - little in the way of detail so it couldn’t be challenged afterwards!”

Even’!! Priceless [grin

MaizieD

^I watched Reeves giving the speech. She repeated said: If we cannot afford it, we cannot do it. But there are a lot of things that the government cannot afford else we wouldn’t have a national debt sitting at around 2.7 trillion.^

Even Jonathon Portes, who is a far from heterodox economists points out that this is an inversion of Keynes well known dictum 'if we can do it we can afford it'. It was this thinking that gave us the NHS and nationalisation post WW2. And it was Keynesian economics that gave us growth and diminishing inequality up to the 1970s.

As to the 'national debt', this article, from a left wing site and I don't necessarily agree with some of its conclusions, does make an effort to find out what constitutes the national debt.
According to OBR figures, of the >£2 trillion owed, £371 billion (or around a quarter) is owed to the Bank of England (BoE). This is about the same as the national deficit.

The BoE is owned by the nation, so in effect this amount is owed by the nation to the nation. There is no imperative for it to be 'repaid'.

The Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum describes the situation as the BoE “nearly financing the deficit.” In addition, £172 billion is owed to the UK’s state bank, National Savings and Investment. So, we owe around one-third the debt to ourselves..

Do you want the government to repay your premium bond holdings or any money you have in an NSI account?

Much of the remaining two-thirds of the national debt is held by private gilt buyers.

Gilt buyers

It turns out that after the UK, Belgium held £197bn-worth of British government debt, followed by Luxembourg (£17 billion), Spain (£440 million), Germany (£289 million), and the USA (£23 million). After that, there was a drop off (e.g., UAE £3 million, Ireland £2.3 million).

So about another third. We're not exactly in hock to the rest of the world...

And the remaining third?

In response to FOI requests the Debt Management Office basically refuse to say

TLE asked the DMO “which companies (e.g., pension funds, asset managers) and entities (including corporations and individual investors), both legal and beneficial, hold UK gilts.” The DMO responded: “The DMO holds information on registered legal holders of gilts, but not on underlying beneficial holders.” So, who are the registered legal holders? The DMO further stated: “The gilts register is not a publicly available document, and corporate and individual holders therefore have a reasonable expectation that details of their holdings will not be disclosed”–even when public money is servicing their debts.

But:

The BBC says that the “buyers of these bonds, or ‘gilts’, are mainly financial institutions, like pension funds, investment funds, banks and insurance companies.

These institutions hold gilts (government bonds) because they are safe investments with a guaranteed return. The government, as a sovereign currency issuer will always pay the interest and principle. So, without those holdings your private pensions would be far less safe, because all other 'investments' carry risk.

Of course, this explanation doesn't account for the secondary bond market, which is basically a speculative vehicle for bond holders to maximise their profits from bond sales. These bondholders won't be contributing much to the domestic economy because they are, in the main, already wealthy and the wealthy have a low propensity to spend in the domestic market.

www.thelondoneconomic.com/business-economics/who-owns-our-national-debt-its-a-secret-287907/

This is one fairly reasonable analysis of the national debt. It does, in fact, comprise individuals and institutions savings and investment. Which bit do you want to be paid back?

It could be said that we could do without the speculators in the secondary bond market and just pay more government spending directly via the Bank of England.

So well informed. Thank you, MaisieD

GrannyGravy13

Peartree I do not need the WFA

I will complain and campaign for it to be reinstated for those who do, those who miss out by a few £’s.

Far more effective than maligning other GN members…

Well said. Too much maligning going on altogether, imo.

Well I didn’t vote for labour and I am not surprised. I am not claiming pension credit so will lose out. I am still working part time at 71 because my state pension and tiny private pension wouldn’t be enough to live on if I did not . ( I still like working but that’s not the point I’ll have to stop at some point)

Labours answer to everything is more taxes or make things more uncomfortable for ordinary people in some other way

Isn’t one of the problems with energy costs is that the previous government got rid of our storage facilities?

Merion

I still maintain that withdrawing WFA at such short notice was indiscriminately cruel. For two winters we have had enhanced payments of £500 or £600 depending on age because of the cost of living crisis. If someone heats their home for six months then that was a very welcome £83 or £100 a month toward those costs. I think WFA was reverting to £200 or £300 this year but it would still have been £33 or £50 a month that people were budgeting on. Reeves would be the frst to day we need to budget responsibly. To take away WFA just a month before the cold weather sets in in some parts of the country seems heartless. How is someone on a limited budget meant to meet that shortfall? Yes, the Chancellor has some hard decisions to make but why this particular benefit? Because it was a quick and easy target? Warmth is at the very base of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: food, water, shelter, warmth and rest. The 1.5 billion saving is a drop in the ocean. As, I said upthread, she should have left WFA alone until other measures were put in place to protect those who are entitled to but not yet receiving pension credit and the results of the Ofgem review of energy standing charges that are costing households £300 a year irrespective of how much energy they use.

!00% agree Merion

ronib

Jeremy Hunt is on video explaining that Reeves is spending £1 billion a day so far. Great British Energy, The Wealth Fund (a misnomer?) and public sector pay increases. What a start and how will it end?

How will it end?

One word -Badly

C’mon. Abbott will happily criticise everything the government does. If her beloved Corbyn had been more electable the country would probably be in a much better place today than it is having had several years of a government fighting with each other. She doesn’t want Starmer to succeed.

Jeremy Hunt is on video explaining that Reeves is spending £1 billion a day so far. Great British Energy, The Wealth Fund (a misnomer?) and public sector pay increases. What a start and how will it end?

New moniker doing the rounds:

Rachel Thieves seems an apt name for our new chancellor.

Even Diane Abbott accuses Rachel Reeves of ‘renewed austerity’ today. The Veteran Left-wing MP takes aim at Chancellor’s spending cuts and warns of ‘more to come’!

Best hold onto our hats.

Himself just said “no wonder their manifesto was so ‘lite’ - little in the way of detail so it couldn’t be challenged afterwards!”

I still maintain that withdrawing WFA at such short notice was indiscriminately cruel. For two winters we have had enhanced payments of £500 or £600 depending on age because of the cost of living crisis. If someone heats their home for six months then that was a very welcome £83 or £100 a month toward those costs. I think WFA was reverting to £200 or £300 this year but it would still have been £33 or £50 a month that people were budgeting on. Reeves would be the frst to day we need to budget responsibly. To take away WFA just a month before the cold weather sets in in some parts of the country seems heartless. How is someone on a limited budget meant to meet that shortfall? Yes, the Chancellor has some hard decisions to make but why this particular benefit? Because it was a quick and easy target? Warmth is at the very base of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: food, water, shelter, warmth and rest. The 1.5 billion saving is a drop in the ocean. As, I said upthread, she should have left WFA alone until other measures were put in place to protect those who are entitled to but not yet receiving pension credit and the results of the Ofgem review of energy standing charges that are costing households £300 a year irrespective of how much energy they use.

I think a better option would have been to tax the winter fuel payment.

I don’t really agree with these “add ons” to the state retirement pension because they can always be removed at the governments whim. Why isn’t there a state pension which is enough to live on without the stigma of means testing, which is lengthy to claim and many don’t?

I don’t like the way that Reeves has attacked the previous government for the “black hole” in spending forecast when as shadow chancellor she should have been aware. It’s just posturing.

Our town centre would die a death if the bus pass was removed. It’s usually full of people my age. Not paying bus fare means there’s money to pay for coffee etc.

Callistemon213

If free bus passes were abolished, would this mean many companies, routes, would have to close down?

They do seem to be endangered anyway.
Good, affordable public transport should mean fewer cars on the road so it would be a shortsighted move.

In our area bus route have been cut already. We had very little notice.

We can no longer get to our county city by bus. People used it for school and college, work, hospital visits and the usual shopping/social visits. Buses still go to the nearest market town so we can still get to a bank. However the cinema is due to close. The buses are one an hour and the last one back is around 7pm. So having a free bus pass from age 66 is of limited use. I have never understood the need for free bus travel for pensioners. My grandparents paid when they used buses. Also free travel for the over 66s clearly doesn't keep the buses running.

I do not live in an hamlet but a large 'village' with a population of over 10,000. We have no bank, no secondary school, a library staffed by volunteers. Doctors are stretched to the limit and shopping is expensive because it can be. Thanks Tescos Express.

Doodledog

I wouldn't presume to say what other people need.

I am not speaking from self-interest one way or the other, as I don't get a State Pension yet.

I too will never receive it as will be 66 in December

HattieTopper

People who are getting the new state pension won't feel the stopping of the WFA as much as we older people on the old state pension as people on the new state pension get much more a month than we do. The difference between the two is £52 per week that means people on the new state pension get £200 approx more every four weeks. See below.......

The weekly rate of the full new State Pension is £221.20 per week. The weekly rate of the full basic State Pension is £169.50 per week.

So before peope on the new state pension start saying they can manage, with the WFA they should realise that they can manage because they get a lot more per month than we on the old state pension receive.

However, you did get your state pension, or where able to claim it, at least 6 years earlier than many of us, plus if you did work after 60 you didn’t have to pay NI as many of us did.

I’m dreading the winter now.

I wouldn't presume to say what other people need.

I am not speaking from self-interest one way or the other, as I don't get a State Pension yet.

Sycamore123

I should be careful in speaking for everyone, many pensioners are just outside the Pension Credit limit who are far from ‘comfortably off’, I doubt they will be very happy!!

I don’t think our posters are speaking for all pensioners. We can manage without it, and my late parents certainly didn’t need it.

I speak only for us, we (husband and I), would rather see the money going to those who genuinely need it to hear their homes and stay well.

I have spent most of any extra on one tooth. Happy Days.

Cadeby

What if you thought you had " made provision" and your life changed dramtically, through no fault of your own?

And yes. Another reason why means-testing is so awful. People often want to have money put by 'just in case', but someone is sure to come along and say they 'don't need' one allowance or another because they have a savings account, and deny them that security.

Doodledog I want to extend universal benefits, not limit them.

Totally agree.

I'd be happier if all income counted, whether it be wages, pensions, interest payments, share dividends, benefits or whatever and then apply income taxes. Wealthy pensioners would have some of any WFA clawed back, those on very limited funds wouldn't. Why some 'income' doesn't count but wages and private pensions always do remains a mystery.

Grantanow

Rachel Reeves has scrapped the social care cap proposed by Dilnot. But Wes Streeting said on 16 June during the election campaign that he wanted 'to give the care sector “certainty” that the cap would be rolled out as planned from October 2025'. Pretty clearly his statement has been proved unreliable to say the least. Dilnot's recommendations have been kicked down the road several times and this is another one.

But there's also this:

However, after the Conservatives also pledged to keep to the October 2025 date, think-tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) pointed out that the current government had allocated no funding for this, with the originally allocated resource having been ploughed into day-to-day council budgets.

The Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) agreed that this meant the likelihood of the policy being implemented in October 2025 was “quite low”.

www.communitycare.co.uk/2024/06/14/no-funded-social-care-commitments-in-labour-manifesto/

From November 2022

As widely trailed, Hunt used his autumn statement today to announce a two-year delay to the adult social care charging reforms, including the £86,000 cap on care costs, which are now due to come into force in October 2025, beyond the next election.

However, instead of retaining the funding allocated for the reforms in the Treasury, Hunt said it would still go to councils, with £1.3bn available in 2023-24 and £1.9bn in 2024-25 to spend on adults’ and children’s social care.

www.communitycare.co.uk/2022/11/17/hunt-announces-two-year-care-cap-delay-to-allow-councils-to-deliver-200000-extra-care-packages/

In short, the previous government had made no provision to fund the care cap. Without that it would fall to council taxpayers to fund.