DWP shake-up means 100,000 people will be 'plunged into poverty'

A new Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) shake up means 100,000 pensioners are set to be plunged into poverty by 2027. It comes as a direct consequence of Labour Party Chancellor Rachel Reeves's revisions to Winter Fuel Payment eligibility, it found.

DWP boss Liz Kendall said in her letter to Debbie Abrahams, the Labour chair of the work and pensions select committee: “Means-testing winter fuel payments was not a decision this government wanted or expected to take. However, we were forced to take difficult decisions to balance the books in light of the £22bn black hole we inherited.”

She added: “Given the dire state of the public finances, it’s right that we target support to those who need it most while we continue our work to fix the foundations and stabilise the economy.” Approximately 100,000 more elderly individuals may be in poverty by 2027, a figure that repeats across 2029 and 2030, albeit with a brief respite to 50,000 in 2028.

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Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK, said: “This government announcement confirms what we always knew: brutally rationing winter fuel payment, as ministers made the choice to do, will swell the numbers of pensioners already living below the poverty line – this year and into the future.”

Jan Shortt, general secretary of the National Pensioners Convention, said: “We find it completely unacceptable that an extra 50,000 to 100,00 older people will fall into poverty as a result of the decision to means test the winter fuel payment. The message to older people is that the government is happy to accept them as collateral damage caused by their policy decisions.”

Helen Whately, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said: “Finally the dam breaks and we get to see what Labour have known all along … Now the true impact of their cut has been revealed it’s time for Labour to reverse it.”

Luke Tryl, the director of the research group More in Common, wrote on X: “While a lot of people gave a sigh of relief after budget and are willing to give govt the benefit of the doubt, the risk is the three groups the public did say were the biggest losers – pensioners, small businesses, farmers can attract a lot of public sympathy.”