Pensioners have been awarded a Christmas bonus of just £10 this year - the same amount as when it was introduced almost four decades ago.

When it was launched by Ted Heath's Tory government in 1972, the bonus payment was worth £98 in today's money.

Still £10.00 more than I will be getting from public funds.......

Many pensioners are today much better off than the younger generation. Many own their own properties which had quadrupled in value (if not more) over the last 30 years.
The younger generation will never get to enjoy that windfall, most will never be able to afford to own their own properties outright.

Personally I take the view that free bus passes, winter fuel allowances and TV licences should be means tested. I won't be expecting to get them and I am only 10 years away myself from drawing an old age pension.

Now you leave off

I've just got my 60+ pass

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Lets be careful out there !

I have mixed views on this, My parents worked hard all their lives. Luckily they paid into a company pension and saved hard for everything. Eventually they paid off their mortgage and so why should they not benefit in some way as all their working lives they had paid into the system, so why should they be means tested. There are far more people that have paid nothing or hardly anything into the system and these are the people that should not get anything or reduced amounts.

Kremmen are you really that old ?

If these sorts of benefits were means tested and lets not forget the many thousands of pensioners who choose to winter in the Costa's then general taxation might be less allowing spending into the wider economy or the younger generations to be able to save to buy a house. All that said the reality is that it is not a question of if they cut this simply when, I suspect it will be after the next election which ever party gets in.

Our economy is rebalancing and has a long way to go yet. Standards of living will fall for all until the UK is again competitive in the World marketplace. This means earnings potential for the younger generations are not going to be the same for the previous. The likes of China and the Sub continent now compete with us on the World stage for goods and services and are quite frankly much more competitive due to the reduced salary levels and costs of living in these Countries.

Benefit reductions announced today in the Autumn Statement along with the introduction next year of UC will in 2 or 3 years seriously reduce the amount of money in people's pockets. I am not talking about the work-shy who drawn JSA or income support (although from this point on these will only increase <inflation) but ordinary working people whose wages are made up with working and or child tax credits.



0.5% interest rates and printing money hasn't worked.

The alternative is not pretty............. 6% interest rates, soup kitchens, tent cities and the army on the streets.

Yes seems tough choices have to be made

And you gave us the impression you were about 30!

I wish

I'm looking forward to retiring and leaving the M25 behind.

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Lets be careful out there !

Left school at 14 as was the norm, worked for peanuts, done my national service, and after 15 months it went up to 2 years, carried on the job I left after demob, never out of work for more than a week until I retired, never a big earner on HGV as it was a just a job got 7/6 a night for digs when away from home and sleeping in cab so could pocket the 7/6 (36p) life was good, the last 30 years before retiring had two jobs 15 years each, two small private pensions plus the OAP and after 51 years in harness reaping the reward of owning my house, eating a few times a week, still wearing the clothes I stored up on when at work, life is not easy, and the world dont owe me a living, I get my pension that HMG claw back a big slice in VAT whatever I buy, and as I say its not the biggest or the bestest its them that make the least mistakes, are the survivors because thats what its all about "survival" just have to forget living life to its full, and settle for seeing tomprrow.

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Its not always the biggest and the bestest, its them that make the least mistakes.

When they admit to five more years you know it will be at least eight. Still the rich are getting richer and are even having their tax reduced. All Balls needed to say was 'deficit will not be reduced by the next election, debt will still be increasing by the next election' and then sit down as the Tory plan is in tatters.

It seems that the Lib Dems are stopping proper cuts and the Tories are blocking all the key Lib Dem lefty policies so we have the worst of all possible solutions that will lead to a Labour landslide at the next election. Maybe not even one Lib Dem will be left in parliament.

Still Dave and George will be OK as they will be well rewarded for their efforts.

Anyone in their 20s or 30s with a skill should be learning a language and moving abroad.

Labour should really walk the next election they definitely have a problem with Balls who is tainted with his time as Gordon Browns bag carrier at the Treasury during the bubble years. If I was Milliband I would be looking to reshuffle him to somewhere else where his past would be less of a liability. Labour have one or two quite bright young guns sitting on their front bench who could probably handle that Treasury brief just as well as Balls.