Winter Fuel Payment: Minister confirms number of those in NI to miss out on

Communities Minister Gordon Lyons has confirmed that almost a quarter of a million pensioners in Northern Ireland will miss out on their winter fuel payment this year after the decision to align with the UK Government's means-testing of the benefit.

Speaking in the Assembly chamber following a question from the UUP's Robbie Butler, the Minister confirmed that 249,600 pensioners will no longer be eligible for the payment as a result of proposed changes to the scheme.

Addressing the figure, the Minister detailed the support that the Department for Communities is offering to those affected by the changes.

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"I have raised the impact with UK Government Ministers on a number of occasions, with ministers from the NIO and different ministers within DWP and elsewhere," the Minister said.

"To put this number into context, that is over 8 per cent of pensioners in Northern Ireland. This is not just the rich, these are not millionaires, these are not just people who can easily afford it. There are many people who are just above the threshold and who are going to be significantly impacted by this decision.

"In terms of mitigation against this, we will certainly do what is in our power. We need to await and see what Barnett consequentials might be available from this and then we need to ensure that we are helping those who are most impacted."

Minister Lyons said that he is "strongly opposed" to the Government's decision to change the winter fuel payment eligibility criteria and that he is "very concerned" about the consequences it will have on the comfort, wellbeing and health of older people across Northern Ireland.

"I circulated a paper for Executive discussion detailing the implications of the changes to the winter fuel payment following the Chancellors' statement," he continued.

"This paper outlined an estimated £44.3m of additional cost excluding additional delivery and staffing costs to the block grant in maintaining a universal payment.

"The paper also estimated a cost of five to eight million pounds cost of delivering an appropriate IT system to deliver universal winter fuel payments in Northern Ireland and a further 20 per cent to development spend per annum for support and maintenance."

The Minister told MLAs that he has already had to make "significant savings" in this year and that he did not have room in his budget to enable the payments to continue.

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