Winter gas fee u-turn in place this yr | EUROtoday

The authorities’s partial U-turn on winter gas funds shall be in place so extra folks obtain the allowance this winter, the chancellor has mentioned.

Rachel Reeves cleared some uncertainty by saying that “more people will get winter fuel payment this winter”.

However, particulars of how the modifications shall be made and who shall be eligible might not be clear till the autumn Budget.

The fee, value as much as £300 to assist cowl vitality prices on the coldest time of yr, was paid solely to these on pension credit score final winter, in a coverage extensively blamed for Labour’s poor exhibiting at latest native elections.

“People should be in no doubt that the means test will increase and more people will get winter fuel payment this winter,” Reeves mentioned.

However, talking to a committee of MPs, the pensions minister Torsten Bell mentioned there could be no return to the earlier system by which the fee was made to all pensioners.