State pensioners in England's snowiest village break silence over losing Winter Fuel Payments

James Rodger

22 November 2024 at 10:03 am·2-min read

State pensioners in the snowiest part of the country have broken their silence over losing Winter Fuel Payments worth £300. The new Labour Party government’s ‘shameful’ winter fuel cuts has angered some pensioners amid rising energy bills in Copley village.

6cm has fallen in Copley this week - causing pensioners to speak out to the Guardian. “As a Labour voter, I don’t like to argue against what they’ve done, but it will affect some in the village,” one resident told the national newspaper.

And a second branded the cut “shameful” and says he must be more careful about using energy in his cottage. “I voted for Labour, hoping they’d sort out the health service. But what have they done? They’ve taken the money off us.”

“I’ve had one storage heater on 24 hours a day recently because there’s frost in the downstairs toilet,” he said to the newspaper. “But why didn’t they just reduce the winter fuel payments? It doesn’t have to be one thing or another.

“Everything seemed all right when Rishi Sunak was in,” he says. “I didn’t vote for Labour thinking they’d be taking our bloody fuel payments. I don’t think any of them have a clue. I won’t be voting Labour again." It comes after Labour MP Zarah Sultana took to Twitter/X to slam the rule shake up.

"According to the government's own figures, means-testing Winter Fuel Payments will push 50,000–100,000 more pensioners into poverty annually. In the sixth largest economy, no-one should have to choose between heating or eating. That’s why I voted against this harmful policy," she fumed.

It comes as the average annual energy bill in England, Scotland and Wales will increase to £1,738 from January, heaping further pressure on household finances, as the price cap rises by 1.2 per cent, Ofgem has today said.

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