Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will make an estimate of the potential impact of the steps her Department has taken to increase the number of people claiming Pension Credit on the cost to the public purse of expenditure on that benefit.

The Government announced on the 29 July 2024 that eligibility for Winter Fuel payments will be linked to those on Pension Credit or other means tested benefits for pensioners from Winter 2024. We have received around 38,500 Pension Credit claims in the 5 weeks since the announcement on 29th July (which is up to and including w/c 26th August). This is compared to around 17,900 Pension Credit claims in the 5 weeks preceding the announcement. This represents a 115% increase in Pension Credit claims received by the Department in the past 5 weeks compared to the 5 weeks before. These published statistics can be found here: Weekly Pension Credit claims received from 1 April 2024 to 1 September 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). It is not currently possible to estimate the expenditure that will result from this.