I expect Powell to just ignore this, but man it’s going to be a political bloodbath this winter.
I think means testing the payment is sound in principle, but the bar to be eligible for it per that of Pension Credit seems way too high. The news stories and vox pops when the cold starts to bite are going to be devastating — to say nothing of PMQs where I imagine we’ll have months of this in prominence.
What should happen is that pension credit boundaries are raised to cover more pensioners as those at the bottom of the state pension pot are still poor, this can be more than funded by dropping triple lock. I still want to see the top 10% of pensioners who qualify for higher rate income tax see their state pension dropped ASAP., another sizable chunk of money.
The good thing about pension credit is that it looks at all aspects of your finances, so it should spot and exclude those who don’t actually need the money who are at the threshold of state pension.
I expect Powell to just ignore this, but man it’s going to be a political bloodbath this winter.
I think means testing the payment is sound in principle, but the bar to be eligible for it per that of Pension Credit seems way too high. The news stories and vox pops when the cold starts to bite are going to be devastating — to say nothing of PMQs where I imagine we’ll have months of this in prominence.
What should happen is that pension credit boundaries are raised to cover more pensioners as those at the bottom of the state pension pot are still poor, this can be more than funded by dropping triple lock. I still want to see the top 10% of pensioners who qualify for higher rate income tax see their state pension dropped ASAP., another sizable chunk of money.
The good thing about pension credit is that it looks at all aspects of your finances, so it should spot and exclude those who don’t actually need the money who are at the threshold of state pension.