Winter Fuel Payment Open Letter

HM Treasury
1 Horse Guards Road
London 
SW1A 2HQ

1st August 2024

Dear Chancellor,

We write to you as charities, campaigners, and other interested groups who are deeply concerned with your plan to remove the Winter Fuel Payment from older people who do not receive Pension Credit.

Across the UK, two million older people live in poverty. The reality of this is living in damp, cold homes, washing in cold water and not using the cooker, all to save money. At least a further one million live with precarious finances and face growing financial insecurity.

We know that you are aware that many people in this situation are entitled to Pension Credit, but almost 40% of those eligible currently don’t receive it. If the decision to link the qualification of the Winter Fuel Payment to whether an older person receives Pension Credit is taken now, it could mean up to 1.2 million older people on low incomes miss out on even more vital financial support.  

As a result, many of them will inevitably be pushed further into poverty.

Restricting the Winter Fuel Payment this autumn does not give the UK Government time to significantly boost Pension Credit take-up to a level that would reduce some of the side-effects of this measure. It will leave many older people on low incomes facing a cold and dangerous winter.  

In addition to having a detrimental personal impact on someone’s mental and physical health, this policy decision also risks having significant cost implications. Evidence shows that cutting the incomes of older people struggling to make ends meet will inevitably put further strain on the NHS and social care system as more people are unable to heat their homes and eat fresh food.

We are also incredibly concerned about the many older people who are just above the Pension Credit eligibility threshold but who do not have enough money to live on. Many of them will suffer because of this change.

Rather than leaving older people in poverty out in the cold, we believe the UK Government should not make this policy change now, and instead work with others to ensure older people living on low incomes receive the financial support they need. We urge the UK Government to:

  • Enact a Pension Credit take-up action plan so that everyone receives the Pension Credit they're entitled to, alongside a broader benefit take-up strategy.
  • In the long-term, conduct a process to establish an adequate level of income needed in later life to avoid poverty, and put in place plans to ensure everyone receives it.

We would welcome working with you to ensure that financially insecure older people have the support they need this winter and in the long term.

Yours sincerely,

Independent Age
Age NI
Age UK
British Geriatrics Society
Carers UK
Centre for Ageing Better
Centre for Mental Health
Christian’s Against Poverty
Civil Service Pensioners Alliance
Cymru Older People's Alliance
Debt Justice
End Fuel Poverty coalition
Fuel Poverty Action
Hourglass
Money Wellness
National Federation of Occupational Pensioners
National Pensioners Convention
Older People’s Commissioner for Wales
Parkinson’s UK
Pilgrims’ Friend Society
Policy in Practice
Royal British Legion
Turn2Us
u3a
Wales Seniors Forum
Wise Age
Women’s Budget Group