Union members stage demo ahead of Labour winter fuel allowance debate

You can claim that the money saved from pensioner benefits is going to give public sector workers a pay rise, you can claim that it's to fill the Tory "black hole" or you can equally claim, with massive supporting evidence, that it is going to help compensate for the tax loss caused by a Brexit which a substantial majority, 60% according to Statista, of pensioner voters supported. Former Monetary Policy Committee at Bank of England Michael Saunders said Brexit is to blame for "persistent" and "lasting" damage to the UK economy. He added that "part of the reason that the Chancellor must raise taxes and cut public spending is because of the damage to the UK public finances that have been caused by the loss of output due to Brexit." That loss is calculated to be well over £300 billion by 2035, and the tax loss to the government is estimated to be around £40 billion a year. That has to be filled which means taxes must rise and services will suffer. A report out this month showed that the "brightest and best" foreign workers, who we were assured by Brexit supporters would queue up to come here, are instead going to EU countries shunning the UK as they prefer flexibility of location and are not keen to tie themselves to a country seen to be in failure and decline. A hit to the economy. Business investment has dropped by 11% as production has moved to the EU or been scaled back in the UK to avoid the extra costs of Brexit. Hit again. Modelling by economists at Aston University has estimated that annual exports to the EU are 17 per cent lower, and imports 23 per cent lower, than they would have been if Brexit had not occurred, with negative impacts increasing during 2023. Another hit, another one among many more. This is why the Tory government refused to publish a Brexit impact assessment - they knew what it would show. This is why Labour's promises of big growth are a fantasy - countries isolated in trade must grow, if they do so at all, by expanding their population. That means more immigration, and not by the "brightest and best" either apparently, which is one of the very things people voting in the referendum hoped to have less of. So inevitably more pressure on public services and housing or no growth. Wes Streeting may boast about bringing in reforms to a NHS funded by growth, but will he just be running to stand still? Perhaps, rather than blaming MPs, pensioners should remember how they themselves voted in the referendum. Did they expect that it was just other people who would have to suffer damage, who would have to foot the bill?