Rachel Reeves knew winter gas cost reduce would plunge 150,000 OAPs into poverty, court docket hears
The decision to cut the winter fuel payment was made in the full knowledge that 150,000 pensioners would be plunged into poverty, a court was told yesterday.
The Court of Session is hearing a legal challenge brought by Florence and Peter Fanning, from Coatbridge, Lanarkshire, against last year’s decision to remove the universal element of the winter fuel payment.
The change was announced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves on July 29.
The Fannings are being represented by former Nationalist MP Joanna Cherry, KC, and Govan Law Centre.
Ms Cherry told the court the UK Government’s failure to carry out an equality impact assessment into the decision to cut the benefit rendered it unlawful.
She said her clients are ‘elderly pensioners’ and have disabilities. ‘Like most pensioners, they live on a fixed income and they struggle to afford to heat their home in the winter. They are exactly the sort of people the winter fuel payment was designed to help.’
Ms Cherry said that as a result of last year’s change, the Fannings had ‘lost their entitlement to the benefit which would have been paid in Scotland this year’.
She asked the court to consider whether the UK and Scottish governments had failed to exercise their ‘duty’ to carry out an equality impact assessment of the decision, or to consult people of pension age who may be affected by it.
Rachel Reeves’ decision to cut the winter fuel payment was made in the full knowledge that 150,000 pensioners would be plunged into poverty, a court hears
Florence (L) and Peter Fanning arrive at the Court of Session to begin their legal challenge
The change was announced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves on July 29 (file image)
Ms Cherry added that the decision may be ‘unlawful for reasons of irrationality and unreasonableness’ because the UK Government knew it would cause ‘significant excess winter deaths’ and jeopardise the health of ‘vulnerable pensioners’.
She said the decision was also taken in the knowledge it would result in 100,000 pensioners falling into relative poverty, and 50,000 into absolute poverty. She told the court it could also be in breach of the Human Rights Act.
She said the UK Government was bound by its obligations under the 2010 Equalities Act, and the Scottish Government had similar requirements under regulations dating from 2012.
The UK Government’s representative, Andrew Webster, KC, said there had been a ‘fiscal driver’ for the change, noting the Chancellor had been seeking to fill a £22billion black hole.
However, he pointed out that as residents in Scotland, Mr and Mrs Fanning had ‘no entitlement’ to the winter fuel payment, as this is available only to people in England and Wales.
Scotland, he said, has its own winter fuel benefit, called the Pension Age Winter Heating Payment.
He therefore questioned whether the couple can be said to have been ‘directly affected’ by the UK Government’s decision at all.
The hearing, which is expected to last two days, continues.
