Age UK has published its own Equality Impact Assessment of the Government’s cut to eligibility for the winter fuel payment.
Four in every five pensioners living below or just above the poverty line will lose the winter fuel payment under planned benefit cuts, according to a charity.
Age UK said its analysis suggested that 10.7 million UK pensioners will lose the benefit, of whom almost one in four (23%) live in poverty – with a household income of less than 60% of the median – or just above the poverty line.
The charity found that 80% – or 800,0000 – of UK pensioners aged 80 and over living in poverty or just above the poverty line will no longer receive the payment, as well as 78% – or 1.1 million – of pensioners with a disability living in the same circumstances.
…
According to the Government’s own equality analysis, an estimated 780,000 pensioners still eligible to receive the winter fuel payment will lose it under planned cuts.
In a document last month, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) also said that more than two thirds – around 71% – of those with a disability and 83% of those aged 80 or over would miss out.
PEACE: Former Labour Party leader and now independent MP Jeremy Corbyn speaks at a London rally for Palestine, September 11 2024
Speaking at the Podemos congress over the weekend, JEREMY CORBYN MP outlines three crucial areas for building a powerful leftist movement across Europe: opposing austerity, promoting peace and combating the far right
AS we look to build a united left across Europe, there are three key issues that can form the basis of a strong, powerful movement: anti-austerity, peace and opposition to the far right.
Europe is heading toward a renewed era of austerity. We have witnessed attacks on wages and conditions all over Europe. Working-class living standards have fallen. Wages have stagnated. Meanwhile, there are more billionaires than ever before.
Inequality is not inevitable. It is the result of decisions that governments take to take money from the many and give it to the few. Last week, the British government celebrated its 100-day anniversary.
In that time, it has made two supposedly “tough” choices. One is to keep children in poverty by retaining the two-child benefits cap, refusing to lift 250,000 children out of poverty. The second decision was to cut the winter fuel allowance for 10 million pensioners.
We are told that these have been “tough choices.” Every day, my constituents make tough choices. Tough choices like deciding whether to heat their homes or put food on the table. Tough choices like taking out a loan to pay for this month’s rent. Tough choices like selling their home to pay for their family’s social care.
The government knows that there is a range of choices available to them. They could introduce wealth taxes to raise upwards of £10 billion. They could stop wasting public money on private contracts. They could launch a fundamental redistribution of power by bringing water and energy into full public ownership.
Instead, they have opted to take resources away from people who were promised things would change. There is plenty of money, it’s just in the wrong hands — and we will not be fooled by ministers’ attempts to feign regret over cruel decisions they know they don’t have to take.
Austerity is not a tough choice. It is the wrong choice. The British government tells us there is no money. At the very same time, they are committing to raising defence expenditure to 2.5 per cent of GDP.
REMOVING caps on benefits could save the government billions of pounds rather than cost money, a progressive economic think tank says.
The New Economics Foundation (NEF) report, published today, says that the cost of benefit caps could be outweighed by the gains to be made from abolishing them.
Gains include easing extra pressure on the NHS and other services resulting from the poverty caused by the caps, according to the experts.
The benefit cap was introduced in 2013 by the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government and limits the amount of benefits a household can receive.
The two-child limit was introduced by the Tory government in 2017. It restricts the application of child tax credit and universal credit to the first two children in households.
The NEF estimates that axing the caps could save £1.5 billion a year over the next five years alone through lower demand on public services.
In the longer term — in 20 or 25 years — children lifted from poverty could have estimated future net earnings of £920 million a year higher, with an extra £490m returned to government through taxation and reduced spending on social security.
“In reducing child poverty rates, pressures on the NHS, schools and social services will reduce, enabling the reallocation of resources to other areas of high demand,” the report states.
Experienced climbers scale a rock face near the historic Dumbarton castle in Glasgow, releasing a banner that reads “Climate on a Cliff Edge.” One activist, dressed as a globe, symbolically looms near the edge, while another plays the bagpipes on the shores below. | Photo courtesy of Extinction Rebellion and Mark Richards
Funds could insulate all draughty homes, fund free bus travel, and retrain millions of workers for a green future
A TEMPORARY tax on the super-rich could generate enough money to fix every poorly insulated home, fund free bus travel and retrain three million workers in green industries, Greenpeace revealed today.
A new report commissioned by the climate group proposes introducing an annual 2.5 per cent tax on all individual wealth above £10 million over the next five years.
This “national renewal tax” would impact less than 75,000 people — 0.1 per cent of the population — and raise up to £183 billion for the Treasury.
…
An analysis by Oxfam found that the richest 1 per cent emit as much carbon as two-thirds of all humanity.
Greenpeace UK’s climate campaigner Georgia Whitaker said: “The oversized carbon footprint of the super-rich is a clear rationale for ensuring that they play an oversized role in fixing the crisis that they have an oversized role in creating.
…
Patriotic Millionaires member Julia Davies, who wrote the report’s foreword, said: “This report highlights that a small, temporary tax on our wealth could transform the lives of millions, while tackling the greatest threat humanity has ever faced — the climate crisis — all while investing in a strong forward-facing economy with quality stable jobs for the British people.”
