Labour’s move to scrap the state pension triple lock isn’t the end of the war on pensioners. It’s scarcely even the beginning.
Andy Burnham’s attack on the triple lock is only the start (Image: Getty)
The triple lock has worked wonders. Collectively, state pensioners get £16 billion more a year than if the state pension had simply risen with earnings, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. That’s worth £800 each year. Burnham says he will scrap the current system from 2030 if Labour is in power. Which is terrible news. Many older people already feel under siege. The attack on pensioners has been building for years, especially on the left. There’s even a phrase for it: intergenerational warfare.
Young people feel older people got lucky. They could afford to buy homes, allowing them to build up wealth over time. The economy and wages were growing, but both have stagnated since the financial crisis two decades ago. Jobs are worryingly scarce today, partly due to Rachel Reeves’s insane decision to make younger workers more expensive to employ.
But the idea that older people had it easy is a fantasy. They toiled for decades just to build up a threadbare state pension, and now that’s under attack. And the real beneficiaries of those higher house prices will be the younger generation when they inherit. Rachel Reeves blitzed them anyway.
Andy Burnham outlines proposed changes to pensions Triple Lock
She began by snatching the winter fuel payment from pensioners on as little as £11,350 a year, before the outcry forced a U-turn. She’s also dragged unused pensions into the inheritance tax net, hiked taxes on any capital gains and dividends, imposed a 2% tax surcharge on savings and rental incomes, and dragged more pensioners into the income tax net by extending the freeze on the £12,570 personal allowance.
Don’t think it’s just Labour. It was Tory Chancellor Jeremy Hunt who unleashed the income tax threshold freeze. He also went in hard on capital gains and dividends, and capped tax-free pension cash withdrawals at £268,275, a threshold that may never rise again.
Hunt’s 4p cut to National Insurance didn’t help pensioners, because they don’t pay it. Yet even Hunt wouldn’t touch the triple lock, and Tory leader Kemi Badenoch is standing by it today. So is Nigel Farage‘s Reform UK. But I’m wondering how deep that commitment is.
It suits Badenoch and Farage for Burnham to attack the triple lock and take the flak today. But can we rely on them to reinstate it afterwards?
This morning, Badenoch admitted it would be “difficult” to reinstate the triple lock if it is completely scrapped or reformed. And she’s right. The money will be instantly spent elsewhere. Burnham would blow it in a heartbeat. Once the triple lock is gone, it’s never coming back. The PM knows that.
Which is why the Express is fighting to defend it today. Because if the triple lock falls, this won’t mark the end of the war on pensioners. It won’t even be the beginning of the end.
Migrant dinghy found within 2 miles off Dover in fresh Channel security scare
EXCLUSIVE: Boat somehow reached British waters unescorted and continued towards the Kent coast before finally being intercepted
32 migrants were found off the coast of DOver (Image: Getty)
More than 30 migrants made it to within two miles of Dover in a fresh security scare for immigration chiefs. Two Border Security Command vessels and an RNLI lifeboat scrambled to a dinghy just two miles off the coast of Dover.
It somehow reached British waters unescorted and continued towards the Kent coast before finally being intercepted. Some 32 migrants were found on board after crossing through fog. The revelations emerged as Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp declared that deporting illegal migrants immediately is the “only way” to protect communities like Piddington from the asylum crisis.
The senior Tory insisted small boat arrivals must be booted out “within a week of arrival”. And he vowed to dismantle the legal architecture used by failed asylum seekers, foreign criminals and visa overstayers to repeatedly fight attempts to remove them.
Mr Philp told Tory members: “The consequence of illegal entry will be immediate removal. Because if illegal immigrants know they will quickly be deported they won’t come in the first place.”
The Tory borders chief pointed to Home Office plans to dump 1,256 asylum seekers next to the picturesque Oxfordshire village of Piddington, which is home to around 350 people.
And he said the horrific murder of Rhiannon Whyte illustrates why ministers must end the small boats crisis.
Sudanese asylum seeker Deng Majek stabbed mother-of-one Rhiannon 23 times in a frenzied 90-second attack after following the 27-year-old from his asylum hotel to Bescot Road railway station in Walsall in 2024.
Majek was later seen dancing and joking in the hotel car park. The Sudanese monster had arrived on a small boat about three months before the attack.
And Mr Philp said: “The truth is we cannot have strong borders while in the ECHR. Successive governments have tried, and it hasn’t worked.
“So, the next Conservative government will leave the ECHR.
“That way we can deport illegal immigrants within a week of arrival. No asylum claims. No human rights claims. Just detention followed by rapid deportation back to the county of origin or to a safe third country.
“It worked in Australia 13 years ago and it will work here today.
“Tough? Yes. But here’s the truth: it’s the only thing that will work to protect places like Piddington, to protect young women like Rhiannon and to protect our borders. And we will do it.”
Mr Philp vowed on Wednesday to “immediately” close Labour’s new safe and legal routes while “illegal migration is rife”.
The Shadow Home Secretary accused Shabana Mahmood of “opening our borders even more” by re-establishing the UK Resettlement Scheme and creating three new community sponsorship routes.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp addresses Tory members (Image: Jonathan Buckmaster / Daily Express)
Under a Conservative government, illegal migration will have to fall to nearly zero before similar schemes are considered.
Thousands of migrants are expected to arrive under Labour’s new schemes every year once they are fully up and running.
Charities, faith groups and businesses will be able to apply to host people from next year. And Mr Philp warned “those coming will have the right to bring in their whole extended families too”.
He said: “Labour now also wants to bring more people here directly from Afghanistan and Gaza – where the October 7th massacre was openly celebrated on the streets. Those coming will have the right to bring in their whole extended families too.
“While illegal migration is rife, the government should not be opening our borders even more – and we would close this scheme down immediately.”
More than 20,000 migrants have crossed the Channel so far this year – including 1,000 in just two days.
Some 418 people were packed into five dinghies on Sunday, while 609 asylum seekers were detected in 8 vessels on Monday.
And Mr Philp warned the small boats emergency has created a “public safety crisis… especially for women and girls”.
He told the Conservative Party Conference: “Girls as young as 12 have been raped by illegal small boat migrants.
“Afghan men are 22 times more likely to commit sex offences than average – one even recently brought a 14-year old-girl he was abusing to the UK on a small boat.
“This is not just a borders crisis – it is a public safety crisis … especially for women and girls. And we must end it.
“What is Andy Burnham’s answer? Not deportation. Distribution. He thinks every town and village should have its own share of illegal immigrants.”
The senior Tory slammed “many on the left” for throwing Britain’s borders open.
He said: “Without strong borders we are no country at all.
“Many on the left think that we should let in anyone who wants to come. That every person with a claim to sympathy should be accommodated. They think only of the supposed rights of illegal immigrants. Or prioritise the rights of foreign criminals to stay here.
“We can’t keep on like this. It isn’t fair to the British people. The cost – financial and social – is simply too high.
“Borders matter. Control matters. Numbers matter.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We have made progress tackling the small boats. Crossings are down significantly, and we have just recorded the lowest number of summer arrivals since 2020.
“We are taking action, with joint efforts preventing over 48,000 crossing attempts and seizing 1,100 boats and engines since the election.
“But we must go further, which is why we are boosting the number of officers on the ground in France and removing the pull factors drawing people here through illegal and dangerous routes.”
