By The Telegraph (World News) | Created at 2024-09-24 06:40:32 | Updated at 2024-09-30 09:26:54
6 days ago
The Labour Government’s winter fuel raid was “inescapable”, a Cabinet minister insisted.
Pat McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, defended Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves’s decision to strip the winter fuel allowance from around 10 million pensioners from this winter.
Mr McFadden told BBC Radio 5 Live: “I understand why some people say that we’d rather that we hadn’t had to take this decision, in a way I feel that way myself.
“But we find ourselves in a very difficult position, where the previous government had to spend the whole of the reserves for this year within three months…Look, it’s a difficult decision, I understand that, and I know there’ll be opposition to some of these things.
“But let me make another point about this. Getting the public finances sorted is an inescapable duty of government. You can’t just run away from it. And we know what happened when people tried to run away from it.”
Sir Keir will address the party faithful at 2pm today on the penultimate day of Labour’s annual party conference in Liverpool.
Government ‘disappointed’ by nurses rejecting pay offer
It is “disappointing” that nurses have rejected Wes Streeting’s pay rise offer, Pat McFadden said.
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster was reacting to yesterday’s decision by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) to turn down the 5.5 per cent uplift put forward by the Health Secretary.
Mr McFadden told BBC Radio 5 Live: “I value our nurses, they’re hugely important to the country, to the NHS and to our ambition to turn the NHS around from the very difficult position that it’s in now. So yesterday’s vote is disappointing, but it’s not a binding vote.
“It doesn’t mean industrial action, and I’m sure that my colleague Wes Streeting, the Secretary of State, will be in dialogue with the nurses so they know that they are part of the project he wants to do, and we all want to do, of getting the NHS back on its feet.”
McFadden: We couldn’t avoid winter fuel cuts
The Labour Government’s winter fuel raid was “inescapable”, a Cabinet minister insisted.
Pat McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, defended Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves’s decision to strip the winter fuel allowance from around 10 million pensioners from this winter.
Mr McFadden told BBC Radio 5 Live: “I understand why some people say that we’d rather that we hadn’t had to take this decision, in a way I feel that way myself.
“But we find ourselves in a very difficult position, where the previous government had to spend the whole of the reserves for this year within three months…Look, it’s a difficult decision, I understand that, and I know there’ll be opposition to some of these things.
“But let me make another point about this. Getting the public finances sorted is an inescapable duty of government. You can’t just run away from it. And we know what happened when people tried to run away from it.”
Good morning
Dominic Penna here, The Telegraph’s Political Correspondent, guiding you through the penultimate day of Labour’s annual party conference in Liverpool.
Pat McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, is on the morning round for the Government.
