Chancellor announces introduction of test that will limit payments to EU overseas pensioners living in warmer climates
The UK's annual winter fuel payment, which is given to all those aged 65 and over, is to be subject to a temperature test, the chancellor has announced.
The test is being introduced to stop payments to pensioners living in the EU in warmer climes. It follows an European court ruling which expanded the entitlement to all people with significant links to the UK.
The Treasury said the test would be based on historic climate data, which contrasts average winter temperatures from the warmest region of the UK (5.6C in south-west England) with average temperatures for other European countries, over a 29-year period.
This means that all pensioners living in France, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Malta, Gibraltar and Cyprus, will no longer get the benefit as they have warmer winter weather.
However the Treasury said that the test, as currently devised, would not bar pensioners living in warm countries outside the EU, such as the India and Kenya.those living in the heart of the French Alps could not.
The test also means that pensioners living in Sicily, where the average January mercury levels reach 13C, could claim the benefit while
Introduced by Gordon Brown at the turn of the millennium after a furore over meagre state pension rises, Labour recently announced that it would stop the payments, worth between £100 and £300, for the UK's 600,000 wealthier pensioners.
Separate to emergency cold-weather payments, the benefit cost the DWP about £2.2bn last year. It has been protected from spending cuts by the coalition along with other pensioner benefits.
Research by the Institute of Fiscal studies thinktank found that only 40% of pensioners used the payments to settle heating bills.
According to figures published following a freedom of information request, the DWP paid £13m to 74,685 pensioners living abroad in 2012. About £6m of that went to pensioners in Spain and £3m went to those in France.
The Treasury said that following the EU ruling, 115,000 pensioners would not get the cash.
In his statement to the Commons, on Wednesday, Osborne said he would stop the rising cost of paying winter fuel payments made "to those who live abroad … in a way that no one ever intended".
He added: "Paying out even more money to people from all nationalities who may have worked in this country years ago but no longer live here is not a fair use of the nation's cash.
"So from the autumn of 2015, we will link the winter fuel payment to a temperature test. People in hot countries will no longer get it. It is, after all, a payment for winter fuel."
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