Winter fuel payments are set to stop for millions of pensioners this year after an attempt to block the cuts failed.
MPs voted on a Conservative motion aimed at halting government moves to restrict the payment to all but the poorest pensioners. It was defeated by 348 to 228 votes – a majority of 120.
On the eve of the vote, Chancellor Rachel Reeves had urged backbenchers to support her change to means-testing, following reports dozens of Labour MPs could abstain in protest.
The result showed 52 MPs had no vote recorded, including some ministers. It is not yet known how many of those were abstaining, as some MPs may have been absent for another reason.
Shouts of “shame” were heard in the Commons chamber as the result was announced, which will mean the number of fuel payments will fall from 11.4 million to 1.5 million this winter.
Only one Labour backbencher, Jon Trickett, voted against the government, posting on X that he feared the measure would cause more pensioners to fall into poverty during the winter.
Mr Trickett, who was a shadow cabinet member during Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, said this winter will be “extremely difficult” for his constituents, “even be a matter of life and death”, and accused energy companies of continuing “obscene profiteering”.
He posted: “In my view the government should be looking to raise revenues from the wealthiest in society, not working class pensioners.”
It is difficult to tell how many Labour MPs who did not vote on the winter fuel allowance actively abstained.
MPs can be absent for a number of reasons, such as travel, medical appointments, or official meetings.
They can receive ‘slips’ – or permission – from the party whips to miss the vote, or be ‘paired’ with someone from the opposing side who also agrees not to vote in order to nullify the effect of their absence.
A Labour source is claiming that only a dozen of the MPs who did not vote on scrapping the winter fuel allowance for most pensioners were “not authorised”.
Labour suggest the numbers not present in the vote are typical and say the average number of Labour MPs absent is 51.
The change is expected to shave £1.4bn from the welfare bill this year, as a step towards filling the £22bn “black hole” Ms Reeves says the government inherited from the Conservatives.
