Chancellor offers extra cash for older people

Chancellor Gordon Brown has promised older people guaranteed
pension increases to ensure every older person is `better off`.

He said every older person would be given a pension increase of
at least two-and-a-half per cent, or at least £100 per year.
He also said the winter fuel allowance would be set at £200
per person for the remaining years of this parliament.

Brown described a new ‘pension credit’, which would be the
equivalent of the working families tax credit, and would help the
government achieve the minimum income guarantee for older
people.

Earlier in his pre-Budget statement he said the working families
tax credit would be extended to childless couples and he aimed to
achieve ‘an integrated tax system’ for all families. All support
for children will be paid to mothers, who he said were the ‘main
carer’.