Lucy Powell, Leader of the House, has told BBC Breakfast that if labour hadn't of 'targeted the winter fuel payment' for pensioners that there would have been a 'run on the pound' and the 'economy would crash'.
Lucy Powell said:
So we've had to take some really difficult decisions that we wouldn't have wanted to have taken around things like targeting now the winter fuel payment. And the reason we do that is because because the deficit was much higher than anyone thought and the the spending was much higher than anyone thought. If we hadn't taken that action, we'd have seen a run on the pound. We'd have seen the the economy crashing, and the people who pay the heaviest price for that are the poorest and pensioners and those on fixed income.
Ms Powell continued:
It's not one that we would have wanted to take, but to try and find in year savings, so savings this year, this financial year, is an incredibly difficult thing to do, which we had, to do. And so means testing the winter fuel payment is something we've had to consider. But but let's just be clear that because of our commitment to the triple lock, which means that pensioners the state pension will increase by either inflation or average earnings or 2%, whichever is the highest, pensioners are gonna see the state pension increase by hundreds, possibly thousands of pounds over the course of this parliament, and and they will be better off the spot.
https://twitter.com/BBCBreakfast/status/1830162391369162800
Esther McVey responded to Lucy Powell's comments:
"I’ve heard some tripe in my time but the Government saying they needed to remove the Winter Fuel Payment from millions of pensioners to avoid a run on the pound tops the charts! Amazing how massive pay rises for train drivers et al doesn’t affect the £ but maintaining WFP does."
https://twitter.com/EstherMcVey1/status/1830551557315637589
