Labour conference backs call to reverse winter fuel payment cut
The IndependentGet the free Morning Headlines email for news from our reporters across the world Sign up to our free Morning Headlines email Sign up to our free Morning Headlines email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. She told the Liverpool conference: “People simply do not understand, I do not understand, how our new Labour Government can cut the winter fuel allowance for pensioners and leave the super rich untouched. But Labour is now in Government, and we can’t keep making everyday people pay.” Alan Tate, of the Communication Workers Union, said the winter fuel payment cut had “overshadowed” the work of the new Labour Government. She said: “Focusing winter fuel payments on the poorest pensioners wasn’t a decision we wanted or expected to make, but when we promised we could be trusted with taxpayers’ money – we meant it. “Yesterday Starmer spoke to the politics of easy answers and the necessity of country first, party second and whilst the introduction of winter fuel allowance means-testing is tough, Labour councillors sat in this hall have been making tough decisions for years.” Simon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said: “Labour Conference has understood what ministers have failed to acknowledge, that removing the winter fuel payment at short notice and from so many people is wrong.