Wendy Morton

I completely disagree with the hon. Gentleman, and my right hon. and hon. Friends have made clear the position on that. Let me return to the point we are debating, which is the winter fuel payment. I would like to think, or even hope, that the Government would have a rethink, although it appears that might not be the case. What is worse is that they seem uninterested in assessing the impact of this decision. They will not do it now, they did not do it before they made the decision, and it seems they will not even consider delaying the measure. Pensioners have faced a cliff edge and they could not plan for this, which makes it even harder. To add insult to injury, more than 30,000 pension credit applications are waiting to be processed. I have been submitting written questions to the Department to try to flush out how many extra staff it has recruited. My figures are different from those given earlier by those on the Front Bench. My numbers are 1,045 full-time equivalent members of staff, and there is still a backlog. Winter is not over and pensioners are still waiting, so why do this Labour Government insist on penalising those who have worked hard all their lives? Pensioners have worked hard, tried to do the right thing by their families, paid their bills, and perhaps saved a little bit of money, only to be kicked at a time in life when they really need that little bit of help, and when it would make a massive difference in so many ways. Labour Members chose to scrap the winter fuel payment for 10 million pensioners, and the really disappointing thing is that I have sat on these Benches and I have heard not one bit of humility. All I have heard is arrogance—