Support for Pensioners

Joe Robertson Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Westminster Hall

[Blake Stephenson]

I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend, and I will come on to the importance of certainty and stability when it comes to pensions, so that people can plan for their futures, regardless of their age. For the Government to pull the rug out from under the feet of vulnerable pensioners with little or no notice at all is absolutely shameful.

Gary has seen the Government that he voted for with hope and optimism for a better life snatch away the lifeline he relied on. If he is on the old basic state pension, he will have seen 86.5% of his triple lock-backed increase snatched back. Indeed, he could well find that it will take until 2027-28 for his income to reach the level that he might have expected to see this winter.

Gary is not alone, because although this Government talk about millionaire pensioners being able to cope, for many of the 9.2 million pensioners losing their winter fuel payment, that really was vital support. The average pensioner, far from being the millionaire fat cat that the Government would like us all to imagine, earns just over £22,000 per year—similar to the income of a worker on the living wage. The level at which the threshold to keep winter fuel payments was set for a single pensioner means that someone could be bringing in less than £1,000 per month and now be one of the “millionaire pensioners” on whose shoulders the Government have chosen to balance the books.

Age UK estimates that 2.5 million pensioners living in poverty or just above the poverty line, including 1.1 million pensioners with a disability, will lose their winter fuel payment. I have heard so many stories from constituents in Mid Bedfordshire about the impact that that will have on them—stories of people who have had to make the stark choice between heating and eating this winter. I heard from a constituent who now cannot shower, who cooks a hot meal just once a week, and who can turn on their heating only when it is “unbearably freezing”. One constituent told me of the struggles to keep their 92-year-old father warm. Their father has dementia, and he keeps worrying about the bills.

[Joe Robertson (Isle of Wight East) (Con)]

My hon. Friend mentions dementia. Nearly 1 million pensioners in this country are living with dementia. Two weeks ago, NHS England published its priorities, and dementia had been removed, as had the target for diagnosing it. Does he agree that that is a huge concern, not only for those living with dementia, but for the millions of family members and friends who support them?

[Blake Stephenson]

I know that my hon. Friend cares passionately for people living with dementia and their families, and he makes a very important point. It is another shameful decision by this Government not to support the most vulnerable in our society, and people should be shocked by it.

Another constituent told me that they have stopped using their cooker and that they now find it difficult even to dry their washing. This Government promised that they would be on the side of pensioners. However, as a constituent recently summed it up for me, they feel

“terribly let down by the Government”.

They are right to feel like that. This Government have let my constituents—indeed, all our pensioners—down. They have balanced the books on the backs of people earning less than £1,000 per month. Even if someone is still eligible for winter fuel payments, they will get them only if they have signed up for pension credit.

The arbitrary barrier of the pension credit threshold will mean that many of our poorest pensioners—Age UK estimates that around 1 million people have weekly incomes of less than £50 above the poverty line—will not receive their winter fuel payment this winter. Potentially hundreds of thousands of even poorer pensioners will miss out on vital support, because the Government expect them to answer over 200 questions—two hundred questions—to access the help they need.

Perhaps I am being unfair.