Martin Lewis warns state pensioners who have more than £11,400 income

Martin Lewis has issueda warning warning over a Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) rule costing state pensioners £3,900 each. The BBC Sounds podcast host was back on the ITV The Martin Lewis Money Show on Tuesday (October 29) night.

During the hour-long special, Mr Lewis had a warning for Labour Party Chancellor Rachel Reeves just hours before the Autumn Budget is delivered. Speaking to the audience, Mr Lewis fielded a question about the winter fuel payment from a woman whose husband died just two weeks ago.

The woman wanted to know if she would be eligible for pension credit. Mr Lewis said: “You have to be on an income of under £11,400 to be eligible. It’s a very tight means test and is critically underclaimed.” Mr Lewis then revealed he will host a budget special of his show on Thursday and hopes the chancellor will join him.

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He warned: “I will be talking about winter fuel payment without you chancellor, so you may as well be here. It would be a lot better.” Speaking on ITV Good Morning Britain previously,Mr Lewis - while interviewing Lisa Nandy - said: “The poorest pensioners, the poorest on under £11,400 - you believe they should get Pension Credit and Winter Fuel Payments but they’re not going to claim. They’re the hardest to reach, you’re not writing individual letters to them, you’re not linking it to Attendance Allowance and Housing Benefit.

“There’s lots you could do. So, to try and talk about ‘we’re targeting the poorest’ the truth is you’re not targeting the poorest. Why aren’t you writing them bloody letters?” He fumed: “The truth is you have to accept you’re not going to reach them because these are the people that are hardest to reach. So how are you going to protect them?”

“You’re taking an uplift of 115 per cent, you’ve gone from 20,000 a month claiming Pension Credit to 40,000, but there are 780,000 people," he said. “You would need at least an exponential rise in the number of people claiming Pension Credit for those prisoners to claim this year. We have to accept. You have to accept there will be many hundreds of thousands of the poorest pensioners under £11,400 income you will not reach this year.

“You are taking money out of their hands. Do you accept the truth, the reality is that’s what will practically happen? I’m saying it, Age UK are saying it, others are saying it. So let’s be honest, you’re willing to accept that collateral damage of hundreds of thousands of poorest pensioners, many with dementia, not getting the Winter Fuel Payment.”