Lord Young of Norwood Green (Lab)

My Lords, I perhaps take a slightly different view on this. Of course, I welcome people being able to get their winter fuel payments. We are still applying the pension credit, which is absolutely right. I do not know what everybody else in this House who got winter fuel payments did with them, but I donated mine to charity; I certainly did not need that £300, and there are plenty of others like me. If I have a concern about government policy, it is this. Nobody seems to recognise that pensioners benefited very well from the triple lock. I do not agree with the triple lock. I may be in a minority, but that money could be used, as people have said, for alleviating child poverty—probably one of the biggest challenges that we face. I am not expecting the Minister to do an about-turn on that one; I am just making a comment. When we go for the triple lock, there is an expensive cost. Tomorrow, we will hear the Chancellor make known how she will balance that budget. I welcome that people on pension credit—who we wanted to claim pension credit—will be able to get their winter fuel payments. In that respect, this is good. I have only expressed my one area of concern.