A SCOTTISH minister has taken aim at a comment Keir Starmer made about the weather during a major speech in the Downing Street rose garden.
The Prime Minister warned “things are worse than we ever imagined” because of a £22 billion “black hole” in the public finances on Tuesday.
He added that the government’s recent move to means-test pensioners’ winter fuel allowance are “tough actions” needed to fix the country’s foundations.
But Maree Todd, the Scottish Government's Minister for Mental Wellbeing, took aim at comments made by Starmer right at the start of his speech, amid the backdrop of a sunny and warm day in London.
“Sunshine, no rain, no wind … probably tempting fate,” the Labour leader said – in an apparent dig at his predecessor’s rain-sodden speech announcing the general election date outside Downing Street earlier this year.
Warm & sunny in the rose garden today. Cold, wet & windy in the Highlands. No wonder the government in London aren’t focused on fuel poverty. My constituents already pay more to heat their homes & Labour are making it worse. Today we’re indoors, heating on. pic.twitter.com/0RhUDaPyYg
— Maree Todd (@MareeToddMSP) August 27, 2024
But Todd – who is also the MSP for Caithness, Sutherland and Ross – highlighted the gulf when it comes to the weather between her Highlands constituency and London.
“Warm & sunny in the rose garden today. Cold, wet & windy in the Highlands,” she said.
“No wonder the government in London aren’t focused on fuel poverty. My constituents already pay more to heat their homes & Labour are making it worse.”
She added: “Today we’re indoors, heating on.”
Stopping winter fuel payments for those who are not in receipt of Pension Credit or other means-tested benefits is expected to reduce the number of pensioners in receipt of the up to £300 payment by 10 million.
The Scottish Government expects that around 900,000 people in Scotland would no longer be eligible to claim the payment, with fears those in colder rural areas are set for a brutally cold winter.
Holyrood was supposed to be taking over the Winter Fuel Payment as a devolved benefit this year but the move led to the Scottish Government postponing the planned Pension Age Winter Heating Payment.
Finance Secretary Shona Robison (above) said she “shared the frustration of everyone”, but that the Scottish Government had “no choice” but to cut the payment.
She said: “Let me be blunt. We could not find up to £160m that has now been withdrawn by the UK Labour government that we were relying on in order to deliver what would have been a broader universal winter payment.
“That really frustrates me, I have to say, because I know about the levels of fuel poverty in our country, in an energy rich country, both energy rich in terms of oil and gas, but also in terms of green energy.
“And yet, because of the constraints of devolution and this unexpected cut, we're not able to deliver what we wanted to deliver."
