Analysis on the impact of welfare reform on pensioner families, undertaken by Howard Reed of Landman Economics on behalf of the TUC, shows that a quarter of all social security cuts fall upon single pensioners and couples, where one adult is of state pension age while the other is below state pension age but not in paid work.
One of biggest hits to pensioner benefits comes from changes to how benefits are ‘uprated’. Measures introduced by George Osborne in June 2010 changed the way benefits are increased annually, from RPI inflation to the lower CPI measure.
The hardest hit comes from the reduction in the value of Pension Credit. The reduction will see pensioner families lose £3.85bn a year by 2016/17, including cuts to the ‘Savings Credit’ element of Pension Credit.
Other cuts include a £138 million ‘annual reduction’ in the value of Attendance Allowance and a £340 million annual cut to pensioners disability benefits.
The introduction of Universal Credit will see people in their mid-60′s turned into “so-called workshy scroungers”, say the TUC, because they won’t be able to claim Pension Credit. They will instead have to claim “less generous” working age benefits.
According to the TUC, the situation faced by pensioners will only get worse after the 2015 general election. Projected government savings of £5bn a year through the implementation of Universal Credit will fall disproportionately on pensioner families, say the TUC. This will increase the total loss of income inflicted upon older people in the UK to as much as £8.75 billion a year.
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